Free Republic

Welcome to those of you who just joined after seeing me on Dr. Steve Turley’s show. Thanks so much for signing up. I cover a lot of topics here but the main focus is the intersection of the future of the evangelical church with men’s issues. I recently wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal about why men turn to online influencers instead of traditional authorities. And I just finished a five part series digging a bit deeper into some of the reasons I highlighted. What Jordan Peterson Can Teach Church Leaders (in the Wall Street Journal) By Men...

Pro-Hamas rally in Iraq, October 14In 2008, Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri bizarrely castigated Hamas, saying that their "blessed Qassam rockets" do not differentiate between Israeli soldiers who are legitimate targets, and children and Arabs who are not.Hamas was embarrassed at being given a morality lesson from Al Qaeda, and it went on to deny that they targeted civilians, saying all of their rockets were only aimed at military sites.After that incident, Hamas press releases on their rocket fire changed the names of the targets from "settlements" to "military bases" that has the same names - like "military base Sderot"...

…Prior authorization is a common cost-cutting tool used by health insurers that requires patients and doctors to secure approval before moving forward with many tests, procedures, and prescription medications. Insurers say the process helps them control costs by preventing medically unnecessary care… That's why desperate patients like Nix—and even some physicians—say they have turned to publicly shaming insurance companies on social media to get tests, drugs, and treatments approved… But some patient advocates and health policy experts question whether insurers are using prior authorization as "a possible loophole" to this prohibition, as a way of denying care to patients with...

The mainstream media has resorted to shaming and insulting unvaccinated Americans as the ongoing COVID pandemic surges, but medical professionals don’t think the "substandard" tactic is appropriate unless the ultimate goal is to further divide the nation. A Washington Post columnist on Tuesday praised French President Emmanuel Macron for a series of discouraging remarks he made about the unvaccinated, urging readers globally to make life a "living hell" for those who choose to forego the vaccine. The opinion column titled "Macron is right: It’s time to make life a living hell for anti-vaxxers," was the latest example of liberal journalists...

China parades lockdown breakers in a truck meant to hold pigsIn the midst of all the talk of the new Omicron variant of COVID-19, China has managed to remain in the background for the most part. That despite the fact that the communist nation originally unleashed the coronavirus on the world by executing a deeply harmful cover-up of what they knew at the time.That feat has been accomplished in two ways. One, China has been relentlessly and laughably misreporting its COVID statistics, with them actually claiming to have only suffered 4,636 total deaths in a country of 1.4 billion people....

Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker signed a new state law Thursday that focuses on students' access to school meals, with provisions around free breakfast and lunch as well as unpaid meal debt. The new law also takes aim at a practice known as "lunch shaming," prohibiting schools from publicly identifying or taking punitive action against students who have unresolved debt for school meals. "The new law is both timely and critical because it boosts federal nutrition dollars to schools across Massachusetts, and keeps children out of what should be an 'adult only' conversation on school meal debt," said Patricia Baker, a...

Japan has carried out a threat to publicly shame people not complying with coronavirus border control measures, releasing the names of three people who broke quarantine rules after returning from overseas. The health ministry said late on Monday the three Japanese nationals named had clearly acted to avoid contact with authorities after recently returning from abroad. The announcement, the first of its kind, sparked a flurry of speculation among Twitter users about the details of those identified, such as their jobs and locations.

President Joe Biden has failed to meet his vaccination goals. There are several reasons for this. Facebook. FOX News. Climate change, maybe. Despite this, we have to convince the people who aren’t vaccinated to get the shot. So how do you convince someone to go against a deeply held belief? It’s hard to say, but I know how I want to convince someone: screaming at them how dumb they are until they change their ways. Thus I’ve decided that’s the best way to persuade people. If we are to save everyone from this pandemic, we have to find all the...

A hearing of the House Subcommittee focused on anti-trust and monopoly abuses examines the role of the corporate media in these growing pathologies. There are not many Congressional committees regularly engaged in substantive and serious work — most are performative — but the House Judiciary’s Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial, and Administrative Law is an exception. Led by its chairman Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI) and ranking member Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO), it is, with a few exceptions, composed of lawmakers whose knowledge of tech monopolies and anti-trust law is impressive. In October, the Committee, after a sixteen-month investigation, produced one of...

According to a post-election survey conducted by Public Opinion Strategies, the biggest ‘shy Trump’ constituency of 2020 was a white, college-educated woman. Days before the presidential election, establishment media like The Washington Post claimed the “shy Trump voter” was no longer a thing. On-brand with big media’s track record of being wrong, exit polls are telling the opposite story. Indeed, there was a “shy Trump voter,” but it wasn’t the blue-collar worker pollsters missed in 2016. Instead, the shy Trump voter of 2020 was a highly educated “she.” According to a post-election survey conducted by Public Opinion Strategies, the biggest...

Jon Ronson’s book “So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed” came out in 2015. It may be the first in depth series of interviews on people who have had their reputations and lives ruined by the return of public shaming through the internet, social media and Twitter.

The recent public shaming of Trump administration officials in restaurants has triggered an internal debate among Democrats over how far they should go in confronting the president and his policies. The boisterous protests against Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Trump advisor Stephen Miller as they dined in different Mexican restaurants, and the ejection of White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders by the owner of a Virginia eatery, caused some Democrats to embrace the strategy as an effective way to rally supporters and hold officials responsible. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles), a frequent critic of the administration, gave a...

Some Democrats are reportedly concerned that public appeals to “absolutely harass” Trump administration officials will come back to hurt them in the polls and benefit Republicans. There have been several recent instances where Trump officials have been publically shamed, including Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen at a Mexican restaurant and White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders, who was asked to leave by an owner of a restaurant in Virginia. On Saturday, Florida Attorney General – and ardent Trump supporter – Pam Bondi was confronted by a group of protesters outside the screening of a documentary about Mister Rogers in Tampa....

A woman from New Zealand is facing backlash after photos of her chin tattoo began making waves earlier this week. Sally Anderson, a life coach, reportedly got the tattoo as an homage to New Zealand's indigenous Maori culture, but some are saying it's offensive on the grounds of cultural appropriation. The tattoo, known as a "moko kauae," has since sparked a debate across the island nation, the BBC reported. The blonde, blue-eyed white woman is reportedly married to a Maori man who has a full facial tattoo, and she claims her body art symbolizes strength after surviving a gang rape...

The names and faces of individuals who were part of last weekend's white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., are being plastered all over the Internet by civil rights advocates. It's part of an effort to shame the people who participated. But it's a tactic that can also snare some innocent people in its net. "Yes, You're Racist" is the name of a Twitter account that has been very active in posting pictures of white supremacists at the Charlottesville march and rally. Logan Smith, who runs the account, thinks other people should see the faces of white supremacists. "They're not wearing...

On Monday, Native Americans conducted a forgiveness ceremony with U.S. veterans at the Standing Rock casino, giving the veterans an opportunity to atone for military actions conducted against Natives throughout history. In celebration of Standing Rock protesters’ victory Sunday in halting construction on the Dakota Access Pipeline, Leonard Crow Dog formally forgave Wes Clark Jr., the son of retired U.S. Army general and former supreme commander at NATO, Wesley Clark Sr. This was a historically symbolic gesture forgiving centuries of oppression against Natives and honoring their partnership in defending the land from the Dakota Access Pipeline.

(Via New Yorker) […] In Iowa, although voter registration information is free and available to the public, voter history is not. That information is maintained by the secretary of state, which licenses it to campaigns, super PACs, polling firms, and any other entity that might want it. So was the Cruz campaign accurately portraying the voter histories of Iowans? Or did it simply make up the numbers? It seems to have made them up. Dave Peterson, who happens to be a political scientist at Iowa State University and is well-acquainted with the research on “social pressure” turnout techniques, received a...

The Iowa secretary of State on Saturday rebuked Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz’s controversial use of a mailer to encourage turnout at the Feb. 1 caucuses. “Today I was shown a piece of literature from the Cruz for President campaign that misrepresents the roll of my office, and worse, misrepresents Iowa election law,” Paul Pate said in a statement released by his office. ...

"Who you vote for is your secret," the letter, posted by some recipients on Twitter, says. "But whether or not you vote is public record. Many organizations monitor turnout in your neighborhood and are disappointed by the inconsistent voting of many of your neighbors." "We will be reviewing ... official voting records after the upcoming election to determine whether you joined your neighbors who voted in 2014," the mailer concludes. "If you do not vote this year, we will be interested to hear why not." So they aren't the only ones and this isn't new. In Alaska, voters have complained...

"We're sending this mailing to you, your friends, your neighbors, your colleagues at work and your community members to publicize who does and does not vote." The letter let Adams know that the senders intended to mail an updated chart after the Nov. 4 election. Increasingly, political groups across the country are utilizing publicly available voter lists and other databases to send mailings that use what researchers call "social pressure" to get people to vote. The most forceful threaten to expose an individual's voting record, or lack thereof, to peers. ...was sent by a political action committee called the Opportunity...