[honk]

While we're on the subject of criticizing avatars, I was deeply hurt to discover that Tom's avatar was not, in fact, a picture of himself, but of a dentist whose name is not Tom Bishop. We trusted you, and you let us down.

[Lord Dave]

So, word has it that Trump's final deal to end the war in Ukraine has a bunch of stuff that Ukraine already had: security guarentees without Nato membership, help rebuilding (maybe), and Russia gets to keep what they took.  As the big highlights.  Including official recognition that Crimea us now Russian.

This has been rejected already.



Trump might want to read The Art of the Deal since he's really really bad at making deals.

[AATW]

This is an oddly ironic form of projection. You are on Team Woke

No, I'm not. I'll add this to the very long list of "things Tom is wrong about".
You really need to stop telling people what they believe.

which is trying to convince normal people that that men can be women, that abortion is just fine, that mass migration is beneficial

I don't believe any of those things. They are all complex issues which people like you try to pretend are simple ones.

and yet you think that the other side is a cult.

If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck...

The way you slavishly defend everything your Supreme Leader does, no matter how clearly wrong.
The way you do mental backflips to believe the obvious lies.
Those are the actions of a cult member.

Grown ups consider statements and actions on their merit. Your first reaction is not "what was said?" or "what was done?" but "who said/did it?".
The answer to that last question then forms your opinion. If it's your Supreme Leader or one of his minions then your reaction is thisisfine.jpg, no matter how blatant the lie or how egregious the action.
Those are the actions of a cult member.

Different beliefs on the issues of trans, abortion and migration are not the actions of a cult member.
My beliefs on all those things are different to yours, they're just not as simplistic and reductive as you have claimed above.

[Action80]

Different beliefs on the issues of trans, abortion and migration are not the actions of a cult member.
My beliefs on all those things are different to yours, they're just not as simplistic and reductive as you have claimed above.

^Trying to find sophistication within patently absurd leftist positions, while at the same time claiming to be a Christian, explains so much.

[DuncanDoenitz]

Different beliefs on the issues of trans, abortion and migration are not the actions of a cult member.
My beliefs on all those things are different to yours, they're just not as simplistic and reductive as you have claimed above.

^Trying to find sophistication within patently absurd leftist positions, while at the same time claiming to be a Christian, explains so much.

So this Guy is born in the Palestine around 1st Century CE; He throws businessmen and financiers out of holy buildings, and tells stories about immigrants coming to the assistance of local people in need.   

Sound a bit lefty-cultist to me. 

[AATW]

[Lord Dave]

https://www.npr.org/2025/04/15/nx-s1-5355895/doge-musk-nlrb-takeaways-security

Summary:
Whistleblowers at the National Labor Relations Board (who work in IT) are seeing DOGE doing things that they really shouldn't.  Bypassing security, procedures, etc..

Now, as an IT expert, reading this report tells me one thing:
They want access and they don't want to jump through hoops to do it.  The only reason you disable security and safety measures is
1) becuase you want to make it less secure so you can let someone else in.
2) because you can't do what you want without doing a bunch of stuff that you don't have time for and just give me full admin rights on my computer so I can install this software I downloaded, ok?

Yeah, I've seen alot of this before.  Shortcuts to getting things working by just "giving full admin rights" or disabling that pesky hostname verification thats not working for my computer for some reason. 

Do I think this is DOGE being evil and trying to let people in?  No.
I think this is DOGE trying to run security like a small office runs security... by not.  Because there's no easier system to get into (for useres or non-users) than an insecure one.

[Tom Bishop]

While we're on the subject of criticizing avatars, I was deeply hurt to discover that Tom's avatar was not, in fact, a picture of himself, but of a dentist whose name is not Tom Bishop. We trusted you, and you let us down.

This is inaccurate. Please respect my privacy and refrain from investigating or publicizing my identity.

[Tom Bishop]

This is an oddly ironic form of projection. You are on Team Woke

No, I'm not. I'll add this to the very long list of "things Tom is wrong about".
You really need to stop telling people what they believe.

which is trying to convince normal people that that men can be women, that abortion is just fine, that mass migration is beneficial

I don't believe any of those things. They are all complex issues which people like you try to pretend are simple ones.

This is a weird lie. You have been on this forum for years and have expressed support for all the leftist woke policies by now. You are a known woke personality on tfes.org.

Here you are supporting the trans journey of society:

https://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=19076.msg263124#msg263124

Where we are as a society right now different sexualities are accepted - so you don't "do" anything about that. With trans stuff we as a society are still on a journey.

Here you are supporting the mass immigration which occured in Britain:

https://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=15509.msg203101#msg203101

Immigration has been a good thing for us economically and in terms of filling skills gaps. Old people don't like it because of "all them foreigners coming over here"

Here you are supporting abortion by trivializing fetuses as "clumps of cells":

https://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=19337.msg264762#msg264762

A clump of cells doesn’t “want” anything and by no sensible definition would you declare it a human life.

and yet you think that the other side is a cult.

If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck...

The way you slavishly defend everything your Supreme Leader does, no matter how clearly wrong.
The way you do mental backflips to believe the obvious lies.
Those are the actions of a cult member.

Grown ups consider statements and actions on their merit. Your first reaction is not "what was said?" or "what was done?" but "who said/did it?".
The answer to that last question then forms your opinion. If it's your Supreme Leader or one of his minions then your reaction is thisisfine.jpg, no matter how blatant the lie or how egregious the action.
Those are the actions of a cult member.

Your view of how policies work is fundamentally wrong. Trump isn't unilaterally making policy decisions on anything. The Republican Party is making these decisions. This is why you got slapped on the Tariff discussion. It's not hard to defend Trump's decisions because his decisions are backed by an array of PhDs, analysts and strategists who have planned this for years in advance through the Right's think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation.

You should also look up the definition of cult. It's "A relatively small group of people having (esp. religious) beliefs or practices regarded by others as strange or sinister, or as exercising excessive control over members" (Oxford). Neither the Republican Party or MAGA are a small group of people, and they don't have control over their members on the level of something like Scientology. Conservativism and traditionalism are also only considered "strange or sinister" to the far left, who are a minority. So you should really reevaluate your definitions.

[AATW]

Here you are supporting the trans journey of society:

How was I supporting it in that post? I was neither supporting nor condemning it. I was just stating as a fact that society is still trying to figure out the trans issue and what to do with it. The weird thing about you quoting that post is that I was largely agreeing with you. You said:
"I have clearly and repeatedly advocated that children should be left to be kids and decide for themselves once they are capable of making rational decisions"
And I agreed with you. I even agreed with you that the Swedish kindergarten you cited was going too far.
I also in that post said that "I don't think young children should be having gender correction surgery or drugs suppressing puberty".
How does that fit into this straw man narrative you have of me being on "team woke"?

Here you are supporting the mass immigration which occured in Britain

I stand by my quote - I mean, it isn't even an opinion. It's just a fact that migration has been a good thing, economically. What I was talking about in that part of the post was the right wing lie that immigrants come over here and are immediately given a free luxury house and allowed to live on benefits.

Here you are supporting abortion by trivializing fetuses as "clumps of cells"

Which at an early stage of development, it is (by the time it's a fetus it isn't just a clump of cells, for the record). Again, that's not an opinion it's just biology. I didn't express an opinion on abortion in that post, I was responding to the assertion that a clump of cells in the very early stages of development is a "human life who wants to live". It doesn't have a brain, how can it "want" anything?

You have two issues here.
Firstly, you seem to believe that trans, migration and abortion are simple, black and white issues. They aren't, they're all complex.
Secondly, you seem to believe that everyone on the left (I guess I lean more that way, but not that hard) believes the same thing. They don't.

Trump isn't unilaterally making policy decisions on anything.

Yes he is. He's used - misused really - powers which are designed to be used in a state of emergency to make policies on tariffs. The fact those policies are informed by advisors isn't really relevant. (Nice appeal to authority by the way, another one of those you do very selectively). Those people advising him don't make the decision, Trump does. And he's doing it unilaterally. Where was the vote on any of this in Congress? There is a bill going through Congress right now which could stop him doing this - although the Republicans would have to be honest and admit there is no state of emergency, I doubt they have the balls to do it.
I note you ignored the video above which lays out how chaotic this has all been, how Trump has flip-flopped on all this. First saying that tariffs are part of the strategy and here to stay, then denying rumours that they're considering pausing them...then pausing them. Then pretending this was the strategy all along. It's a mess.

Whether you lot technically fit in to the definition of a cult isn't that relevant. You act like a cult member Trump acts like a cult leader.

[AATW]

D'oh!

[Lord Dave]

Man, being beaten by a brain dead Joe Biden has got to hurt.

[WTF_Seriously]

Pretty good explanation of Tom, A80 and the rest of Cult47

[Shane]

https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/ice-deports-3-u-s-citizen-children-held-incommunicado-prior-to-the-deportation

imagine unironically deporting citizen babies with cancer

[Lord Dave]

https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/ice-deports-3-u-s-citizen-children-held-incommunicado-prior-to-the-deportation

imagine unironically deporting citizen babies with cancer

And I bet people like Tom and Action are cheering this.  Those fucking MAGA.  Evil to the god damn core.

[AATW]

https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/ice-deports-3-u-s-citizen-children-held-incommunicado-prior-to-the-deportation

imagine unironically deporting citizen babies with cancer

And I bet people like Tom and Action are cheering this.  Those fucking MAGA.  Evil to the god damn core.

It interesting how much that lot care about unborn babies.
And how little they care about actual babies, children or adults who are vulnerable.

[Lord Dave]

https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/ice-deports-3-u-s-citizen-children-held-incommunicado-prior-to-the-deportation

imagine unironically deporting citizen babies with cancer

And I bet people like Tom and Action are cheering this.  Those fucking MAGA.  Evil to the god damn core.

It interesting how much that lot care about unborn babies.
And how little they care about actual babies, children or adults who are vulnerable.

I suspect its a disconnect between the concept of direct killing vs indirect killing.
If a child dies of a disease becuase they can't get medical attention... oh well.  Its not murder and not something I could have stopped.

[Lord Dave]

https://www.npr.org/2025/04/26/nx-s1-5378077/honduras-deported-girl-citizen

First they came for the illegals.
Then they came for the citizens who were children.


This is why we have courts: Because ICE isn't someone you can trust to give you a truthful answer.  That kid could have stayed with their dad/partner.  That's typically how it works.  Or another family member.  The fact that ICE is saying this is what she wanted is not something anyone can verify.  Which, again, is why we have fucking courts!

[Action80]

The amount of lying and crying here for criminal migrants is astounding, considering the ones doing the lying and crying actually don't give a fuck either.

[Lord Dave]

The amount of lying and crying here for criminal migrants is astounding, considering the ones doing the lying and crying actually don't give a fuck either.

You're a criminal migrant as far as ICE is concerned.