Jay Dyer, What’s the Endgame for Atheists? |352|

[Sciborg_S_Patel]

Close but no "cigar".

Aw I was hoping FDRS was cozy in marital bliss...and I would love to hear from the woman who could go toe to toe with him on the daily. ;)

 

[Vault313]

Is there really a loosening of morality - it seems more people accept rape is wrong (even in marriage which IIRC some religious figure deny), that more people are willing to recognize their faith can't be legally imposed on the rest of us, people are less willing to knowingly conquer other nations - which religion justified - and drain their resources, enslave others (again many religion organizations accepted this), etc.

From my perspective it seems we are more moral than at any other point in history. I also don't know if decadence is inherently immoral - I mean if someone lives lavishly using money they earned is that immoral because higher taxes or a different trade structure would let that money go to someone else? I mean I understand the argument, and after a point I might agree, but this seems like the road to communist tyrannies. Other kinds of supposed decadence would, it seems to me, lead to religious fundamentalist tyrannies.

On the Camille clip I don't really get the argument even after watching the video - what exactly connects the loosening of morality and the trans movement or trans persons? Forcing children into thinking their trans would be bad, but are there an extreme number of cases?

People can be mistaken (even catastrophically) about something - gender transition for children might end up being one of those things - without being immoral. (Whether it is wrong I've no idea, from what I've read there are possibly some cases where it might be the least worst decision though without avenues like past-life regression as a possible treatment we won't know.)

That said AFAICTell Paglia isn't a scientist but she seems to try and pronounce what she believes about others' subjective evaluation. It's amusing to see various conservative outlets carry this clip given the evidence for a personal deity is - because it makes a metaphysical claim that applies universally - is a weaker form of subjective evidence (if it counts at all) than what someone - like a trans person - says about the reality of their own subjective boundary of experience (their own body).

She also, AFAICTell, doesn't really make the historical case connecting people's gender identification with historical collapses.

I suspect she dislikes trans persons because they upset her particular feminist beliefs - lots of feminists seem to hate the existence of any trans people. I suspect she thinks there's something special about women (the inversion of a misogynist that it seems radical fems share) and dislikes people born biologically male "invading" this special-ness. But truth here likely rests in biology and possible even parapsychology - Can souls be gendered so the soul ends up in the wrong body? Or would past life regression allows someone who is trans to accept their current biological orientation?).



My Roman history is rusty and was never honestly that developed but from what I recall the surface accusation of promiscuity was done as a cover for other political considerations - much like we alliances between religious fundamentalists and corporate powers.

If Augustus thought using laws to control people's behavior was going to save Rome my guess - which might change upon further research - is he fell for the idea of simple explanations over the complexity of rational ones? It reminds me of the silly pastors post 9/11 who blamed groups he didn't like for lifting "God's shield" from the US as an explanation for why 9/11 happened.



Well if there is an objective morality, and slavery/war/genocide/subjugation are all bad, then it seems we are better off?



Not sure what you mean? Do you mean alien encounters suggesting other civilizations are more advanced?



Well IMO we aren't necessarily a more rational society, nor is spirituality necessarily irrational. But IMO the weakening of religious fundamentalism and its irrational recourse to Divine Command Theory (which IMO Plato disproved long ago) has made the world a better place. Unfortunately we've still got a chasm to cross, and that's the materialist fundamentalism that makes all human existence completely worthless but "skeptics" somehow have gotten into their head as a vehicle for humanism.

As for what we've lost I'd agree but we might differ on the exact losses - it does seem like the shamans killed off by colonization (partly supported by religious fundamentalism), rejection of the Gnostic Gospels, the esoteric movement of the Renaissance weakened by the alliance between mechanists & the Church, etc did hurt the human race and leave us where we are now.

I think your being quite unfair to Paglia here. There is zero evidence that she "hates trans people" or believes women to be superior.

I think she is just someone who believes in true equality and has a penchant for telling the truth as she knows it, regardless of how "PC" it is.

The absolute fact is, we live in a society that worships science but is increasingly unscientific.

Nothing has shown this more than the current hit button issue of transgenderism. Not a whole lot of research is available on transgenderism because it just hasn't been treated with any real scientific regard until more recently.

Take Dr. Kenneth Zucker. He ran a clinic for transgender youth for over 30 years. In that time, his research has shown that approximately 75% of children who have gender dysphoria actually end up identifying as cis-gendered, with a strong leaning toward homosexuality or bisexuality.

But that's awfully inconvenient for current "gender affirmation" activists, so they initiated a witch hunt and shut his clinic down. New York Magazibe did a good write up on the issue:
http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2016/02/fight-over-trans-kids-got-a-researcher-fired.html

In defending their approach, Zucker and his colleagues point frequently to the small but consistent body of research suggesting that something like three-quarters of children with gender dysphoria will “desist” — they’ll eventually come to feel comfortable with their natal gender (and will also, relative to the general population, have an increased likelihood of eventually identifying as gay or bisexual). Some trans activists have howled at this claim — they believe that desistance is a transphobic myth entirely. But while these activists (and some researchers)* have tried to poke holes in the consistent findings about gender-dysphoria desistance, they just haven’t come up with scientifically convincing explanations for why the studies would all be wrong, and all in the same way. (Some skeptics argue that these studies lump in many kids who aren’t that gender dysphoric and who therefore weren’t going to become trans anyway, but that’s just not true, especially when it comes to the more recentsamples.)

The fact is, he's not the only one to be ousted because of an inconvenient view.

The fact is, to many who willingly and gluttonously partake in PC culture, science doesn't matter to them. Truth and facts don't matter. It's all about their feelings and their individual perspectives, which can and do change in a whim.

That's not the way a society should go about tackling difficult issues.

 

[Doppelgänger]

Yes. As the parent of 2 millennials and obviously having encountered many of them through the course of life, it's pretty safe to say that generalizations simply don't apply. I actually feel bad for this generation of kids. College debt and wage stagnation are a double whammy. People having kids where both parents work at $12.00/hr. Ugh. When my daughter talks about having kids I shudder. And bring them into what kind of world?

I only have one kid because I can't afford another (he is 7), and I really did want two kids. I have my own college debt and don't want to pass it on. I think I am going to teach my son arts and humanities, and then tell him he should also learn a trade skill. You can always fall back on a skilled trade.. until the robots happen.

 

[Vault313]

Really? I think most parent's of millennials are GEN-Xers. You may need to reformulate your generalization.

Actually, both Gen X and Boomers gave birth to Millenials, with Boomers making up the bulk of parentage. Older X-ers and younger to mid Boomers.

My children would be considered gen Z. They're too young to be part of the millennial crowd, but my daughter would be considered on the cusp, so some millenial, some gen Z. Her attitudes reflect this. My son who is younger shows more of the shift toward conservativism that many are talking about. Talk about SJW's around him and he rolls his eyes and says how "retarded" the whole thing is.

I'm younger Gen X. Millenials haven't even given birth in any large numbers yet. So it goes something like this: Boomers/older X-ers give rise to Millenials, with older Boomers/cusp Boomers having given rise to Gen X (as such, we are a small generation, roughly half that of both boomers and Y). Gen X/older Millenials give rise to Gen Z.

Generations aren't cut and dry. There really isn't any kind of distinct line between them.

My in-laws for example show traits belonging to both the greatest generation and boomers. My parents, being young boomers show more boomer traits (meaning sociopolitical beliefs/attitudes).

Gen X is a small generation that hasn't really been able to effect much social change (for better or worse). We mostly get drowned out between the Boomers and the Millenials. Both of which, I think, show very similar sociopolitical beliefs, which makes sense since mostly boomers gave rise to gen Y and most professors are still Boomers.

Also, unless X-ers were/are having children in record numbers (we aren't), gen x simply isn't large enough to give rise to the high numbers of Millenials.

 

[Doppelgänger]

I think your being quite unfair to Paglia here. There is zero evidence that she "hates trans people" or believes women to be superior.

I think she is just someone who believes in true equality and has a penchant for telling the truth as she knows it, regardless of how "PC" it is.

The absolute fact is, we live in a society that worships science but is increasingly unscientific.

Nothing has shown this more than the current hit button issue of transgenderism. Not a whole lot of research is available on transgenderism because it just hasn't been treated with any real scientific regard until more recently.

Take Dr. Kenneth Zucker. He ran a clinic for transgender youth for over 30 years. In that time, his research has shown that approximately 75% of children who have gender dysphoria actually end up identifying as cis-gendered, with a strong leaning toward homosexuality or bisexuality.

But that's awfully inconvenient for current "gender affirmation" activists, so they initiated a witch hunt and shut his clinic down. New York Magazibe did a good write up on the issue:
http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2016/02/fight-over-trans-kids-got-a-researcher-fired.html



The fact is, he's not the only one to be ousted because of an inconvenient view.

The fact is, to many who willingly and gluttonously partake in PC culture, science doesn't matter to them. Truth and facts don't matter. It's all about their feelings and their individual perspectives, which can and do change in a whim.

That's not the way a society should go about tackling difficult issues.

Hahaha, I actually wrote a whole post addressing this issue, but I decided not to post it.

However, I do not think Paglia is a good example. She has been consistently anti-woman since the 80s. Yes, I read her two most famous books, and she has this weird fixation on Madonna and BDSM Catholicism. There are better sources than her, and I bet she is jumping on the bandwagon because she is running out of fame and controversy.

But yeah, some people here want to deny that women live in a material reality, and we should roll over and forget about women's rights and pretend we don't even exist or have our own issues that men can never understand, such as sexual harassment, menstruation, pregnancy, birth. Or even have a right to privacy. Or that sexual orientation doesn't exist, etc.

But people get really upset if you talk about this stuff. <shrug>

 

[Doppelgänger]

Actually, both Gen X and Boomers gave birth to Millenials, with Boomers making up the bulk of parentage. Older X-ers and younger to mid Boomers.

Hey now, don't go mixing us Gen Xers with the Boomers, because we hate the Boomers! :-) My parents actually had me on accident, so it's my siblings who are the annoying boomers and I'm just a lowly Gen Xer! :)

 

[Vault313]

Hahaha, I actually wrote a whole post addressing this issue, but I decided not to post it.

However, I do not think Paglia is a good example. She has been consistently anti-woman since the 80s. Yes, I read her two most famous books, and she has this weird fixation on Madonna and BDSM Catholicism. There are better sources than her, and I bet she is jumping on the bandwagon because she is running out of fame and controversy.

But yeah, some people here want to deny that women live in a material reality, and we should roll over and forget about women's rights and pretend we don't even exist or have our own issues that men can never understand, such as sexual harassment, menstruation, pregnancy, birth. Or even have a right to privacy. Or that sexual orientation doesn't exist, etc.

But people get really upset if you talk about this stuff. <shrug>

Really? Hmmm. Guess I'll have to look into her more. Still, I think she makes some valid points.

I can actually see a pretty strong anti-male attitude in society today, especially straight white men. Considering the fact that I have a son, this issue is of concern to me. I want my daughter to have all the opportunities her brother does, and I'd say she does. I don't see anything or anyone standing in her way.

The question is, could there come a point where my son may not have the same opportunities as my daughter? Sounds crazy in this "patriarchal" world, but worse things have happened, only to leave those who come after to ask "how did people let this happen?".

 

[Doppelgänger]

Really? Hmmm. Guess I'll have to look into her more. Still, I think she makes some valid points.

I can actually see a pretty strong anti-male attitude in society today, especially straight white men. Considering the fact that I have a son, this issue is of concern to me. I want my daughter to have all the opportunities her brother does, and I'd say she does. I don't see anything or anyone standing in her way.

The question is, could there come a point where my son may not have the same opportunities as my daughter? Sounds crazy in this "patriarchal" world, but worse things have happened, only to leave those who come after to ask "how did people let this happen?".

I sent you a PM

 

[Sciborg_S_Patel]

I think your being quite unfair to Paglia here. There is zero evidence that she "hates trans people" or believes women to be superior.

I think she is just someone who believes in true equality and has a penchant for telling the truth as she knows it, regardless of how "PC" it is.

Heh, I don't remember Paglia caring about decadence in her interview for Playboy Magazine, but I'll see if I can find the interview online.

I don't know if she thinks women are superior, but there seem to be a lot of feminists angry about the idea that people born bioligically male can be female. Some of them seem to think gender is a social construct, which does not seem to be the case according to our current knowledge of neuroscience.

The absolute fact is, we live in a society that worships science but is increasingly unscientific.

The rise of secularism across the globe suggests we are more scientific than ever?

Nothing has shown this more than the current hit button issue of transgenderism. Not a whole lot of research is available on transgenderism because it just hasn't been treated with any real scientific regard until more recently.

I'd agree there isn't much research, but it's not clear to me why you'd think the pro-trans side was unscientific:

Is There Something Unique about the Transgender Brain?

Check the Science: Being Trans Is Not a 'Choice'

Take Dr. Kenneth Zucker. He ran a clinic for transgender youth for over 30 years. In that time, his research has shown that approximately 75% of children who have gender dysphoria actually end up identifying as cis-gendered, with a strong leaning toward homosexuality or bisexuality.

But that's awfully inconvenient for current "gender affirmation" activists, so they initiated a witch hunt and shut his clinic down. New York Magazibe did a good write up on the issue:
http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2016/02/fight-over-trans-kids-got-a-researcher-fired.html

I've read about this case from "conservative" sites like NY Mag and "liberal" sites like Think Progress.

It doesn't seem as cut & dry as some on both sides would want us to believe. I would agree there seems to be an aggressively pro-trans side unwilling to accept counter-evidence, but similarly it seems to me there's an aggressively anti-trans side as well just as much in denial.

It seems the kind of thing that biology and psychology will sort out - and possibly parapsychology if we include past-life regression which I think may end up alleviating at least some cases of trans & gender dysphoria. Or perhaps it will give us greater reason to think souls are gendered and support the existence of trans - there's some indication from parapsychology that subtle bodies do have genders themselves. Perhaps there's a mismatch between subtle bodies and biological ones.

EDIT - TRIED TO EDIT ONE SECTION AND A WHOLE CHUNK OF MY REPLY GOT DELETED....

 

[Vault313]

Hey now, don't go mixing us Gen Xers with the Boomers, because we hate the Boomers! :) My parents actually had me on accident, so it's my siblings who are the annoying boomers and I'm just a lowly Gen Xer! :)

Honestly, I kind of hate the generational crap, because there's far too much overlap and the fact that it was created by marketing teams to brainstorm how to sell the most crap to the most people by trying to analyze overarching societal attitudes and beliefs.

It's marginally useful because trends to persist within certain demographics, but ultimately it cannot account for what I think are a large number of outliers. Each generation brings forth good and bad. And will always be judged most harshly by those who came after, lol!

 

[Doppelgänger]

Honestly, I kind of hate the generational crap, because there's far too much overlap and the fact that it was created by marketing teams to brainstorm how to sell the most crap to the most people by trying to analyze overarching societal attitudes and beliefs.

It's marginally useful because trends to persist within certain demographics, but ultimately it cannot account for what I think are a large number of outliers. Each generation brings forth good and bad. And will always be judged most harshly by those who came after, lol!

I agree. It's chopping people into tiny pieces so they can sell them some... shit.

 

[Sciborg_S_Patel]

However, I do not think Paglia is a good example. She has been consistently anti-woman since the 80s. Yes, I read her two most famous books, and she has this weird fixation on Madonna and BDSM Catholicism. There are better sources than her, and I bet she is jumping on the bandwagon because she is running out of fame and controversy.

It's funny I have a close friend who studied under her and both him and his girlfriend seem to admire her a great deal. I can see some of her points as valuable but it does seem she wanted to buck the trend to get recognition to some extent.

 

[Doppelgänger]

It's funny I have a close friend who studied under her and both him and his girlfriend seem to admire her a great deal. I can see some of her points as valuable but it does seem she wanted to buck the trend to get recognition to some extent.

Interesting. She seemed to peak in the late 80s, early 90s, and I remember when Salon gave her a column and everyone HATED her, but that was in the 2000s. She is not a feminist, and she has some very, very "conservative" (wink) ideas.

I just ignore her now.

 

[Vault313]

Yeah, I actually agree with you. It's like the millennials are being set up to take the fall. It's mainly the media talking shit and blaming it on the M's. (Though it's true, Tumblr is pretty bad.) But it's a bunch of people in their 30s and 40s telling everyone else what Millennials are up to. So annoying.

You know, I never thought of it like that.

Though I'd argue it's a great deal of radical left-wing professors and media figures setting them up. They fill them with a particularly hateful ideology (yes, hateful. You've got kids running around punching "Nazis" getting people fired for "wrongthink", lighting things on fire because they disagree with the outcome of an election, shutting down college campuses for non-existent racism, etc.) and quite literally goad them into bad behavior. And that's not to say that I think ALL Millenials are like this. I know a great deal of them are not. Sadly, a lot of them are afraid of speaking up.

A lot of these SJW's and the like don't present arguments, they use threats and insults to shut people down. And unfortunately, it's been quite effective at preventing a lot of other Millenials from speaking their minds.

 

[Vault313]

agree there isn't much research, but it's not clear to me why you'd think the pro-trans side was unscientific:

I never said that. I said many of the arguments used by activists are based on feeling and rhetoric, not science.

Moreover, had you actually read up on Dr. Zucker, you'd see he was in no way "anti-trans". Quite the opposite. He was interested in actually helping trans people utilizing various methods that were more or less tailored to the individuals needs. It just so happened that he found that when children were given the time and space to figure out their identity on their own, with support, they often settled into their birth gender.

He also worked to address the co-morbidities that very often are associated with gender dysphoria, such as anxiety and depression. In fact, he found that in some cases, treating the co-morbid conditions actually relieved the feelings of gender dysphoria.


Instead, society is hell bent on transitioning children based on what a child thinks. They want to fully immerse a child in trans culture instead of providing a supportive atmosphere that allows them to mature before making such drastic, life altering decisions.

I've said it before, I wouldn't allow my children to decide what to eat for dinner at 8 years old (since it would largely consist of cookies and ice cream) much less determine definitively what gender they are going to live as for the rest of their lives. Don't call CPS on me or anything, but I actually made my kids eat zucchini, and they hated it! I know, borderline child abuse. I should have made them banana splits instead.

So what we understand as the emotional and cognitive stages of development that children go through are being ignored to push some kind of agenda. Which is odd, because no one has been able to answer me what "rights" transgender activists are fighting for. What rights don't they have? I'm genuinely confused by this. So what ARE they pushing for, and why?

Society wants to treat children as little adults, which is wrong, wrong, wrong!

I cannot help but wonder if this really does have something to do with normalizing sexuality in children; which is not even something children can fully understand. They do not have the cognitive capacity to understand the full implications of sex and gender. They think gender means dressing in pretty pink dresses and playing with barbies, when the truth is there is far more to gender than mere superficialities.

This is what I mean by the notion that we live in a society that worships scientism but is very unscientific. It's not about truth, facts or following the data. It's all about what sounds nice and feels good.

 

[Doppelgänger]

It's funny I have a close friend who studied under her and both him and his girlfriend seem to admire her a great deal. I can see some of her points as valuable but it does seem she wanted to buck the trend to get recognition to some extent.

Hey, Sci, can you link me the evidence that there is a huge difference between male (bro) brains and female (laydee!) brains? You referenced it earlier in the thread, but I lost track as this whole thread went off the rails. Thanks!

 

[Sciborg_S_Patel]

Hey, Sci, can you link me the evidence that there is a huge difference between male (bro) brains and female (laydee!) brains? You referenced it earlier in the thread, but I lost track as this whole thread went off the rails. Thanks!

The futility of gender-neutral parenting

One recent study, published in Infant and Child Development, showed that these preferences emerge as early as nine months of age — before children are developmentally aware that gender differences exist, at around 18 months.

Another piece of evidence comes from studying girls who were exposed to high levels of testosterone prenatally, in the case of a genetic condition called congenital adrenal hyperplasia, or CAH. Girls with CAH tend to be gender nonconforming, and will prefer toys that are typical to boys, even when their parents offer more praise for playing with female-typical ones. This speaks to the vital role of hormones in developing gender preferences and sex differences in behavior, more broadly.

We also see the same trend in our primate cousins, including rhesus and vervet monkeys. Young female monkeys gravitate toward dolls while male monkeys prefer wheeled toys, despite the fact they aren’t encouraged by other monkeys or their caregivers in their choices.

In the face of scientific data, the gender-neutral movement nevertheless continues to gain momentum. Indeed, its adherents took heart in a study published last year in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,which touted the idea that the brains of women and men are identical. If so, that would offer support to the theory that gender is an artificially created, outdated concept.

meta-analysis of 126 studies found that men have larger total brain volumes than women. Men also show greater white matter connectivity running from the front to the back of the brain, while women have more of these connections running between the two hemispheres.

Additionally, when researchers reanalyzed the same brain data from the “no sex differences” study, they found that it was possible to correctly identify whether a given brain was male or female 73% of the time. But this discovery did not receive much attention from the media, and as a result, the initial study’s misinformation continues to spread.

I'm not saying it's the final word - if such a thing as a "final word" is possible in science - but it does seem to me there are physical differences in brains. Of course these are also tendencies - the author of the article notes she was very much "masculine" in her childhood preferences.

As the author - Debrah Soh - notes, the mistake is to confuse the *is* - probability of certain brain differences - with an *ought* - women and men should be restricted or at least pushed into different roles and denied others.

She also thinks transitioning should not be recommended until later in life if at all, which shifted my thinking which was more "liberal" about this. I don't have a solid position on this, as I've seen counter arguments from others as well. I really do wish we could add past-life regression therapy into the mix, it might help us understand the whole issue better.

 

[Vault313]

Sorry, Vault, but you're seriously wrong here: SJW-ism is not a logical continuation of Libertarian Left path of 1960s - 70s, but its authoritarian distortion and effective betrayal of the ideals and goals of that era. It is also as hostile to free love as it is to free speech.

Read this old British Libertarian Left activist, who was inspired by the 1960s, was the part of the Left movement in 1970s and early 1980s, then gave up when Thatcher crushed the Left cause in the UK. He returned to the Left movement in the 21st century... and was horrified and disgusted when he saw its current condition: look here, here, here and here.

How is it as hostile to free love? Forgive me if it's in one of your links, I haven't had a chance to look at them yet.

 

[Doppelgänger]

The futility of gender-neutral parenting



I'm not saying it's the final word - if such a thing as a "final word" is possible in science - but it does seem to me there are physical differences in brains. Of course these are also tendencies - the author of the article notes she was very much "masculine" in her childhood preferences.

As the author - Debrah Soh - notes, the mistake is to confuse the *is* - probability of certain brain differences - with an *ought* - women and men should be restricted or at least pushed into different roles and denied others.

She also thinks transitioning should not be recommended until later in life if at all, which shifted my thinking which was more "liberal" about this. I don't have a solid position on this, as I've seen counter arguments from others as well. I really do wish we could add past-life regression therapy into the mix, it might help us understand the whole issue better.

I'm not talking about trans or transitioning. Can you show me the studies that say that there are huge differences between male and female brains? The only ones I have seen have minute differences, if that, and are not conclusive, and there is the issue of neuroplasticity.

 

[Vault313]

Heh, I don't remember Paglia caring about decadence in her interview for Playboy Magazine, but I'll see if I can find the interview online.

I don't know if she thinks women are superior, but there seem to be a lot of feminists angry about the idea that people born bioligically male can be female. Some of them seem to think gender is a social construct, which does not seem to be the case according to our current knowledge of neuroscience.



The rise of secularism across the globe suggests we are more scientific than ever?



I'd agree there isn't much research, but it's not clear to me why you'd think the pro-trans side was unscientific:

Is There Something Unique about the Transgender Brain?

Check the Science: Being Trans Is Not a 'Choice'





I've read about this case from "conservative" sites like NY Mag and "liberal" sites like Think Progress.

It doesn't seem as cut & dry as some on both sides would want us to believe. I would agree there seems to be an aggressively pro-trans side unwilling to accept counter-evidence, but similarly it seems to me there's an aggressively anti-trans side as well just as much in denial.

It seems the kind of thing that biology and psychology will sort out - and possibly parapsychology if we include past-life regression which I think may end up alleviating at least some cases of trans & gender dysphoria. Or perhaps it will give us greater reason to think souls are gendered and support the existence of trans - there's some indication from parapsychology that subtle bodies do have genders themselves. Perhaps there's a mismatch between subtle bodies and biological ones.

EDIT - TRIED TO EDIT ONE SECTION AND A WHOLE CHUNK OF MY REPLY GOT DELETED....

You know, I had no idea that NY magazine was "conservative". While I understand and agre that bias may be at play when a certain viewpoint is extended, sometimes we get way too hung up on what is "liberal" and what is "conservative".

If the ideas are sound and backed up by good evidence, I don't care if it's a publication by the KKK.
(I would just be very careful about verifying their claims).

It's a logical fallacy to a priori dismiss an opinion because you don't like the person or the group they represent.