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Comment by kortilla | Hacker News Reader

Teenage targeted publications are actually pretty common ground for extremist viewpoints. It’s an audience pretty receptive to new ideas. Not having “adult responsibilities” nor having to really be a functioning member of society in general makes Marxism, Ayn Rand Capitalism, etc all pretty palatable and reasonable ideas (albeit normally to different cliques).

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Fox and old white man media generally seems chock full of extremist propaganda and to have a throughly receptive audience. Frankly I think you're reguritating a Fox talking point.

Calling Ayn Rand Capitalism extremist is a Fox talking point now? Isn’t that channel usually associated with right wing extremism?

Is it possible that you didn’t understand the point I was making and you retreated into a political tribe reaction?

You should re-parse that sentence, because you're misrepresenting what I wrote.

You claimed I was regurgitating a Fox talking point. What talking point do you think that is?

The TP I'm referring to is the oft repeated idea that young people can't coherently weigh options because they are young, have no responsibilities, don't earn money etc. That's not what I see in the young people (approx 15-25) I know.

Oh and that when they are older they'll all become conservative voters of some type in the political centre, but that's another thread.

While there’s plenty of crap on Fox, this kind of attitude is also ignorant, narrow, and dismissive and fails to break out of the current American political dialectic. Social engineers often use various tactics like teen magazines to influence the young, often by appealing to sexual appetite (post-war Bravo in Germany comes to mind). Sexual liberation is an effective tactic for control. Communists, for example, have always sought to subvert societies from within and perhaps especially by targeting the young. Fox has its purpose, CNN has its purpose, and Teen Vogue has its purpose.

"Sexual liberation" propaganda? What decade are you from? Have you met any teenagers lately?

All political movements attempt to harness the energy of youth. But seeing men move the invisible levers to control the world's youth via Teen Vogue? In the era of Tik Tok and FB Instagram?

In the same vein, are there not a worryingly amount of adults with actual "adult responsibilities" that think conspiracy theories, failed political ideologies and screaming batshit insanity into social media are "palatable and reasonable ideas".

In fact, I'd argue they outweigh the younger audience by a far margin, are supported by media organisations and have done far more damage to our society and world.

Almost every young person I know wants one thing. A fairer, safer, more equal world. I can't say the same for most older people I know. If that makes them the extremists, then we are lost.

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