Comments by "JLH" (@Kyarrix) on "The Majority Report w/ Sam Seder" channel.

@wvu05 I understand what you're saying but it's clear that it's a young kid. And having the whole group laugh and make fun of him is just going to solidify his views. You're not going to get someone to think if you mock them and humiliate them. What's the point of posting the video? Look at us look how funny we are look how we tear apart this young idiot. Why is that a good thing? It really is low-hanging fruit and I expect better from Sam, not necessarily the rest of them.
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@annamari7863 thank you, I felt like I was arguing into the void.
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@18skeltor This was 3 years ago, I had to scroll through the entirety of the comments to remember what it was in regard to! I like Sam, I think he is a decent person and well intentioned. I found this video frustrating because you don't change anyone by mocking them. I'm not perfect, I've mocked people and I have been unkind. Probably too often. It just struck me that someone like that kid, who is still so young is the person you want to try to persuade, someone you won't persuade immediately but who might benefit from the seeds of thought being planted. That's the person you want to treat with a degree of decency and kindness so that they don't double down on their mistaken beliefs. I understand that it would be a stress reducer to have a fun time laughing but this video struck me as ugly. A crew of people sitting back laughing and mocking someone who absorbed erroneous beliefs from their environment. If we want a decent society, if we want even a chance at persuading people this is not the way to go about it. As for your comment about following them? This was years ago. Obviously I didn't do that nor would I. Moreover, you have absolutely no clue as to whether their mind can be changed. The fact that you are so certain that it's not possible puts you in the same camp as they are. One of ignorance and harm. There are plenty of people whose minds are changed over time. Of course it doesn't happen from one conversation, no one thinks it would. The point I was making that apparently eluded you was that rather than plant the seeds, and I hope you understand what that means, they chose to mock him. You don't persuade someone from one conversation but you can create room for questioning. If you think a reasonably intelligent person has no chance whatsoever of ever questioning the things they believe, why are you here? What's the point in anything? That is patently untrue and stupidly nihilistic. It's work to meet someone where they are and to try to offer them information that would allow them to question the things they believe. It's hard work and it can be both thankless and frustrating. It's work that I'm not doing right now because I'm not being particularly patient with you. I get irritated when people on our side, loosely defined, don't understand that we do harm when we cause people to double down.
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MD are you? Do you call all of the older women who are out of touch dinosaurs? What about the older men? What about your parents or your grandparents? Do you roll your eyes at them and think of them in this way? Do you agree with the guy above who said that her face looks like something drawn on a scrotum? Did that make you giggle, do you find it funny? No. There's a lot of sexism in this and it needs to stop. Nancy Pelosi should retire. She does not represent the values of the vast majority of people in this country. There is a real problem with the fact that she became so wealthy while performing the role of a public servant. There are real issues here. Why do you and so many like you content yourselves with taking potshots at her age and appearance? Would you want to be dismissed on the basis of your age and have your appearance mocked? Do you think that this kind of hatefulness feeds anything positive? I will continue to do whatever I can to persuade people to vote out people like Nancy Pelosi. I will do whatever I can to get progressives into government. I feel as strongly about this as you do, possibly more for reasons I won't go into here. But it is so disheartening and disturbing to see those with whom I share many important beliefs and positions sitting here indulging their worst impulses.
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Z'Q Nope, sorry. Your sarcasm notwithstanding - she isn't a liar. Calm yourself. It is reasonable to say that in THIS year with Trump and his rabid base a woman would have a lot of difficulty getting elected. He has a reputation for truthfulness. So does she. Why are you in such an ugly rush to crucify her? What is the problem that you have? You want to cannibalize those who are on our side out of an abundance of ideological purity? Bad idea. He believes a woman can be elected - possibly not this year. She has had a disgustingly difficult time. Try some empathy - how would it be to be her? How would it feel to be smart and able and to run up against sexism time and time again? Watch the interview with Chris Matthews and his disbelief that a woman should be, you know, believed. This is something women deal with every day. Imagine how that would feel and how RAW you'd be after years of it - and then if you do that, you'll see how she might have misunderstood something. Get a hold of yourself and your own sexism in rushing to judgement. Christ. You all want to crucify people on OUR SIDE for some perceived failing rather than directing your energy towards those who really are a threat. Your Last Mohican comment told everyone reading exactly where you stand. Seriously, go to hell with that - when you jump on the Trump train to insult Warren you show yourself to be the lowest of the low and not worth my or anyone else's time.
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@stoneman472 I can be more direct. You're a condescending ass and not half as bright as you think you are. And that is probably generous. You thrive on trying to get under other's skin. You don't represent anyone or any beliefs - you're here solely to feed your need to troll. You could as easily be on the right. Grow up.
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@vanessamw1140 Thank you for this response. I've seen the same thing and it's chilling. It won't push me to the other side because their beliefs are antithetical to who I am but it does make me feel a lot of frustration and sadness. If you say something about it you're accused of moralizing, if you don't then you are quietly acquiescing to it.
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@steik6414 I wasn't reacting to the majority of the video. As a general matter Brooks frequently goes too far and that's why I said something. He panders to the uglier side of his audience by making these kinds of jokes. You called it moralizing. What should do, quietly acquiesce to it, be silent? The whole point of the left is to limit suffering, to make the world a better place for more people. Not to be snide or ugly or celebrate the death of another person. It's not that he made a joke, it's how he courts that ugliness and encourages it. He almost always goes just that bit too far. I understand that it is for the benefit of his audience but what that feeds in his audience is also what I am objecting to.
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@komlat253 You're right. But after being cursed at, mocked and told to f off you'll have to forgive me if I get a little acerbic. I tried to answer and explain twice and had more abuse thrown in my direction. I wrote a genuine response to the person I later became sharp with. There was no response to that only more of the "f off, hahaha, lib clutching pearls" rubbish. I agree that as a general matter it is much better to be civil and try to engage in a conversation with as open a mind as we can muster.
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@theelectricant98 I'm aware of how he got his money and I am as far from a fan of his as you can get. Some of his general advice has helped a certain type of mostly white, mostly millennial male. The problem is that it is often a gateway to the alt right. It would be really interesting to talk about that and from my perspective he is clearly a bad actor. He is very much for a traditional hierarchy. I've read some of his work, I've watched some of his videos, and it would be difficult to find someone with whom I disagree more. But that said, let's attack the substance. I was objecting to the unnecessarily ugly innuendo, to the smirking and sniggering. The fact that I find someone intensely dislikable doesn't mean that I would celebrate misfortune befalling them or think it right to smear dirt on their son or daughter. If this book was put out by him and he okayed his daughter being on the cover in a bikini, there is so much we can say about that but there is a line and Brooks crossed it.
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@theelectricant98 The grift yes, the rest of it not so much. Of course we should point out how absurd he is, the nature of the grift, all of it. I was objecting to the other part, to the suggestions that he lusts after his daughter and the smirking celebration of that masked as edgy humor. With respect to the so-called diet, apparently there is a small segment of the population who do benefit from eating this way. I read that this could be because their gut is so messed up that it functions as a reboot, an extreme elimination diet that allows their gut to heal. I wouldn't advocate it in the absence of a nutritionist suggesting it for a short period of time.
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@steik6414 Moralizing is by definition a negative. It is "the action of commenting on issues of right and wrong, typically with an unfounded air of superiority." There is no unfounded air of superiority here. It is worrisome that you need me to tell you why it is wrong for a comedian or presenter or whatever you want to call Brooks to engage in smirking sniggering jokes about someone lusting after their daughter. It is concerning that this is something that would now be called moralizing. There are values that should be understood to be universal. Why do you want to encourage the worst of human nature? Brooks has a platform, he is looked up to that plenty of the people who come to this channel. That gives him a responsibility. If he makes jokes people absorb that humor and it becomes part of their view of what is correct and right. It is more than a tacit acceptance, it is encouragement. I am surprised and astonished that this has to be explained. Why not ask me next why it is wrong to steal or rape or murder? It's okay to cast ugly aspersions on someone, to call that out is now, in your view, moralizing. What comes next on this slippery slope? Are you going to tell me that it is moralizing to say that it is wrong to smash someone's head in with a bat? Will you tell me that there are some situations where it is okay? Of course it hurts the left's values. We, most of us, stand for the proposition that it is better to reduce suffering and misery. To try to live our lives as thoughtful decent human beings. If someone is a bad actor, call them out on substance. To sit back and snigger over so-called edgy humor that panders to the ugliest impulses harms us. And it opens us up to the accusation of hypocrisy when we call out the other side for similar behavior.
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@steik6414 Your argument is disingenuous and you aren't addressing the issue - you are sidelining it and minimizing it. I wasn't sure if this was because you genuinely didn't understand but at this point I'm fairly sure that you do. Your choice of language is the giveaway and the fact that you aren't addressing any of the points I've been making. I can't help you with that but I can decide to not participate any further and I am making that decision. You are free to continue to argue that it's just fine and funny to make jokes about an individual lusting after his daughter, that there is no harm in, that it's all for the lols, and funny. You can persuade yourself, as you have already done, that this is a valid position and that you "are afraid" you don't understand the issue. You aren't being truthful. I know that and so do you. It is not a valid position to take. You also seem to think that your language is subtle - please trust me, it is not. Nor is "absurd" of me to "allow" (allow?) people to vote in elections but to prefer that they not be exposed to a constant barrage of ugly jokes that are demeaning and damaging. It's absurd that you claim to not understand the difference. I'm going to guess that you're okay with rape jokes too. Hey, why not, it's funny, right? Holocaust jokes okay with you? By your metric why would they be a problem? Everything is fair game, it's only a "joke" - it doesn't do any harm, right? Wrong. It does tremendous harm. It is beyond the scope of a comment to try to educate you on the many ways in which this does harm. And I suspect that you already know some of them but are engaging in pretense for some reason. People are formed and charged by the things they are exposed to. So called edgy humor about a man lusting after his daughter is distasteful and offensive, it isn't funny - you want to deride Peterson? There is so much about the man that is awful - take something valid and make jokes about it - do not make puerile smirking jokes about him wanting to screw his daughter. It cheapens the discourse and over time damages those who come back for more. Is one stupid offensive joke a problem? Not necessarily. A constant barrage of it is an issue. Ask yourself where the line is - where your slippery slope takes you. I don't think that you will because your comments aren't made in good faith.
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I wonder if his slowness of speech and sluggish thinking are residual effects of covid. He uses the word "like" a lot and does not inspire confidence. It's worth remembering that chiropractors are not medical doctors. This is not to say that they don't have something useful to offer nor is it to suggest that there aren't plenty of medical doctors who practice medicine poorly, but it is worth bearing in mind.
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Boomers? Bernie is a boomer. Every boomer I know is voting for Bernie Sanders in their state primary. I was listening to a podcast this morning from the New York times and the woman who was talking about not being able to vote for Bernie was in her 30s or 40s, not a boomer at all.
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@brentshowers741 You're saying that a boomer state of mind is an old state of mind? Are we talking people in their '50s or '70s? Because the hippie movement is the boomers. Those people embodied forward thinking. I guess I'm just questioning the idea that boomers are a group of people who are old and responsible for all of the bad things. Among my acquaintances almost every boomer voted for Hillary after wanting to vote for Sanders. It was the millennial cohort that got disgusted and stayed home, engaged in protest votes or voted for Trump in an attempt to blow the system up and hasten big changes. Gen X here btw.
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@TheYakisobaNoodle Anyone who uses the term dumb fuck to another person for voicing an opinion is showing themselves to be exactly that. You are doing our cause no good by revealing to others that we are exactly the same - crude, unthoughtful and lacking in the ability to show discernment and judgment.
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No, Sam. In this case I think you're wrong. I am no fan of Meghan McCain's, she's irritating and far too privileged and not but she does have a point. Speaking as another Jewish person, someone who has studied their history and the Holocaust, we know that the use of hypnotized in this context is suspect and should never have been said. I'm not sure if Ilhan Omar is actively anti-Semitic, she does have a history of saying things that suggest it. The right wing hypocrisy notwithstanding it's important to acknowledge that there are serious issues with the things that Omar has said. Maybe it was a coincidence that she used a term that mirrors things used against Jews at the time of the Holocaust, but in the absence of anything additional I'm not going to give her the benefit of the doubt. I am going to reserve judgment while fighting my instinct to find her distasteful. She said some things that by any reasonable standard were objectionable and potentially dangerous, and these were the things for public consumption. Like you, I support Israel although not the right wing government. Anti-Semitism is on the rise for that reason it's important to be very careful, there are plenty of people who confuse Jew and Israeli and are happy to have an excuse to exercise their not so latent anti-semitism. I would really like it if the other folks who present this with Sam would stop the background cackling. You want to make fun of people who are ridiculous, that's one thing but the background laughter makes you seem like a bunch of teens snickering at someone. It's unappealing and distasteful. Overt mockery should be used sparingly.
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Please get rid of Michael Brooks. Let him have his own show and do his own thing but please don't have him heading up segments here. He is cringe-inducing, snarky in an ugly way that doesn't have an underpinning of decency and in general just distasteful to watch. I hover over the unsubscribe button every time I mistakenly click on a video where it is all him.
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I understand why this is so funny but it's deeply terrifying. Both parties have neglected education, we now have a population that lacks critical thinking to an unprecedented extent. That these people believe right-wing propaganda even in the presence of so much proof to the contrary is a deeper problem than the pandemic for the long term. How do we move forward as a country? I'm going to sleep, this is too depressing to think about.
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Wait what? Did Brooks just say that Jewish girls are whiny and that it's true, and that's okay? I was watching Sam's face and he didn't seem too comfortable with that. This is what we mean when anti-Semitism is discussed, the latent form of it seems to live in pretty much everyone and it doesn't take much to have it come out. A similar joke about a different group would never fly, you could never make a joke about some alleged negative quality that black or Arab or Hispanic women are supposed to have. I find this guy so very distasteful. I'm glad he has his own show now maybe he will show up here less. He adds nothing and detracts significantly from the show.
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@danielbenitez4120 that's not a response. What are you trying to say?
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The cackling in the background is consistently irritating. I'm not sure why the show does this, is it meant to cue us to laugh? For the most part I enjoy Sam Sedar but the Greek choir in the background would benefit from being toned down.
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Just stop it. Just stop calling them disgusting time and time again, you know what you're doing, you have to be aware that it is a dog whistle for your supporters. You show a grossly overweight unappealing white woman, and older white man and you call them disgusting, you talk about destroying them, you incite anger and rage. I hear you carefully walking it back, I hear you saying on a political and power level after you have said destroy them and destroy them and destroy them and they are disgusting, you know what you're doing and it is as bad as what they are doing. They are ignorant, they are afraid, and they are terribly uneducated. What is your excuse for inciting rage against them? What is your excuse for the pious self-satisfied virtue that you are displaying? Let's be very clear, I am 100% on our side politically, but this display is abhorrent as theirs is. It's very easy to incite rage by showing an obese person eating in a diner and not showing sympathy for undocumented immigrants. If you have to garner support by mocking someone and tearing them down viciously by referring time and time again to their appearance, then you lack substance and decency. Attack their positions, not their persons. When you do this you turn people off and if you don't, if the people you are throwing red meat to enjoy it, don't you understand how easily they can be turned? Inciting rage and hatred is never the better way forward. You are so steeped in self-satisfied rage and what you believe to be justified hatred that you don't see these people as human. If you hate them so much how are you different from Trump and his ilk? Dehumanizing people is always going to be a first step towards violence. You've taken this much too far and you are absolutely in the wrong for doing so.
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Why do you pick on Meghan McCain so much? Granted, she is offensive and her views are terrible but that's the case for many people on the right. She is an easy target. I think that's what bothers me, she's a woman, she's overweight, you enjoy mocking her and I guess the audience likes it. These are all reasons for me to not find it particularly attractive.
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Does Sam ever do videos without the chorus of sycophants cackling behind him and chiming in? Because for the most part I enjoy watching him but everytime they add something or laugh off camera it is eye roll inducing.
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I just heard Sam's co-presenter say that if the virus kills people in red states, she referred to it as the "chud belt" it would be a silver lining. I had to play it a couple of times to be sure I'd heard correctly. I'm not protesting this to be morally or ethically clean. I'm bringing it up because a human being doesn't view the potential deaths of millions of people as a benefit under any circumstances. I understand the anger even the rage because I frequently feel it too but the vast majority of people living there are ignorant not actively evil. Wishing them dead or making jokes contemplating their deaths with a kind of macabre relish is ugly and makes us darker. Don't make jokes like that. It's not funny or edgy and it hands ammunition to people on the right that we do not need to give them. Worse it makes me wonder about my place on the left. Do we really consider the potential deaths of uneducated, ignorant people as a silver lining? When I think about that I feel anger and sorrow. No matter how much we disagree with the majority of people in those states, they are human beings. They have children, families, loved ones, hopes and dreams. They've been poorly served by the educational system in this country. There are reasons for the way they think and those reasons are what we should fight. When I'm confronted with a Trump supporter stomping and spewing hatred, I lack patience and get angry but I would not make a joke, at least I hope it was a joke, that their potential deaths to this pandemic would be a silver lining.
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Well said and thank you!
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Please don't have a split screen with Michael Brooks. I enjoy watching you and listening to you most of the time but Brooks is a liability. The snark and smug self-assurance that he brings to the screen do not help you and are irritating to watch.
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Why the mockery? The whole cackling gallery is irritating. It feels like a group of sycophants feeding each other and egging each other on. I detest Bill O'Reilly but this video doesn't invite me in. I think it's correct to be critical of our side when we engage in stupidity, and these videos that appear in my feed, with a bunch of people laughing, cackling, mocking someone on the other side are distasteful. He's right about the phone issue, it is annoying to be behind someone holding up a phone or an iPad at a concert. I'm at least 30 years younger than he is and I agree with him on this, don't you?
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It is that outrageous. There's no need for the cynical interpretation. You can hear the real emotion in his voice. Take the win. Take the allies when they appear, don't look for ways to diminish their support. And for the guy on the right, Scarborough did not suggest that the insurrectionists should be shot in the face. Don't intentionally misinterpret. It's becoming such that when Sam isn't around the quality of the show goes down. What Scarborough said was that if they had been black or Muslim they would have been shot in the face. He was not advocating for shooting them, he was pointing out that if they had not been white Trump supporters they would have been shot. And he's right. It's good that someone like Joe Scarborough recognizes the double standard and racism in our society. It's a win when more conservative white people can see that there is a problem.
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Hey Sam, can you let the guy, the comedian who thinks he is so very funny, do his own thing on his own new show? Because he's not funny, he is irritating and it detracts from your show. Thanks.
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@jamesdavis5729 I appreciate your response. I thought I was going to get attacked for it, but I really enjoy Sam's content most of the time, the other guy not so much. I'm likewise not a big fan of the whole Greek chorus thing where everyone chimes in and cackles in the background.
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@jamesdavis5729 Thank you for the subtle correction. I'm not sure why I said Greek choir, it's chorus as you said.
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