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Yes, massive fraud. No, this video isn't proof of it. This video is just outrage bait.
Was this filmed the day it was released? No, could have been filmed... December 25th? December 24th? It clearly wasn't filmed in the Summer. It's not like this was a culmination of years of investigation.
There's enough CONFIRMED fraud going on in the Somali community that your priors that this sort of business is fraudulent, at least to some large degree, should be high enough to make an educated guess rather than outright dismissal.
Plus, the Boomer guy straight up says he's been paying attention to this for years.
So in a sense, yes, yes it is a culmination of years of investigation.
See my comment here: https://www.themotte.org/post/3430/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/395401?context=8#context
There's a pretty simple argument to suggest that fraud, if it can be proven to exist at all, is probably pretty rampant in Somali communities.
Premises:
The Somali community in Minnesota is probably tight-knit and interconnected, moreso than most other groups in the state. Lots of communication channels amongst them and between different circles of them.
The Somali community would thus likely be aware that there's a bunch of sketchy daycare business operated in their area, and these receive federal/state funds.
Nobody notable in the Somali community has raised an alarm as to this practice, and I've not heard a single word of condemnation from any of them. Quite the opposite.
What might we conclude about the Somali community?
Do we conclude that they are harsh and intolerant of fraudulent behavior in their midst? That they are quite honest and rule-following on average?
Or is the obvious implication the precise opposite, that the majority of them are probably cool with fraud going on (maybe they don't even see it as immoral) even if they're not participating, and good many of them are participating?
Or which premise do you take issue with?
Are Somalis NOT tight knit in this area? Do they somehow NOT know that their family and neighbors run these sketchy daycares? Or are they actually coming forward and reporting on fraud all the time, but they're ignored?
Which premise fails?
Your analogy falls apart the second you notice that Christians are constantly calling each other out and even condemning each other for preaching falsehoods (as they see it) and are not prone to covering for each other merely because of shared theological beliefs.
Famously, individual denominations take massive issue of tiny disagreements in interpretation and are quite happy to make their disagreements known, and distance themselves from 'heretical' street preachers and the like.
What exactly do you think I am saying here. I take issue with 0 of the premises. I also hate this video. What is being misunderstood?
My analogy to a Christian street preacher does not fall apart because the whole point is that it's not all that weird to call out arguments you hate that are on your side! I am against fraud and against Somalis that don't assimilate remaining in America. I also hate that the video is what got people interested in the problem. Just like I would be alarmed if a video of a street preacher acting crazy was getting attention as the one true proof of Christ's divinity.
This is complete "Who gives a shit?" territory and the only reason people are responding is because they think you're making a larger point than you are. Nobody thinks there isn't fraud, including you apparently, and nobody is going to stop noticing because some youtuber didn't follow your preferred protocols.
I hoped we'd all care about not looking like fools, but apparently that's concern trolling or something.
If you're not looking a fool at least some of the time, you're not doing anything of consequence.
Particularly if you hope to stand up to any bully or petty tyrant who would call you a fool.
There will always be people happy to accuse their detractors, political opponents, or outgroup a bunch of idiots.
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Guess I misunderstood the thrust of your point.
Me, I have accepted that you don't get to choose how certain issues make it to mainstream prominence.
(I've been aware of the Epstein situation for like twenty years, and I'm just happy that people at least notice it now)
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Of course it’s not proof. It’s a spotlight, and a question begger about what’s going on and why it took him to highlight it
“well of course there’s fraud, a this guy is pointing to it, but see he’s pointing wrong, so can be dismissed or agreed with where convenient”
It’s just cake-eat-having commentary.
It's like being a Christian and suddenly a street preacher video is blowing up online. The preacher's argumentation isn't sound and he's weirdly confrontational towards a handful of people just going about their day (and yeah, those people are sinners, but it's still confrontational.)
Wouldn't it be kind of frustrating for this to be the thing that takes off as proof of Christianity, and not all the actual scholarship? If I were to say I wasn't a fan, but I still was a Christian, would that be having and eating cake?
The video's author could personally come to my dwelling and fart loudly in my face, cheeks spread wide open and splattering me with the fecal remnants of his last shit and his observation would still be valid: the daycares that don't admit new children and conspiciously don't have any sounds of children (they are not quiet, let me tell you) are frauds and you should be ashamed that you are even defending this position.
Anyone who goes 'he's right, but he didn't say it in GOOD FAITH' should be shot by a firing squad.
I don't know where you get the idea that a daycare center can't sound quiet from the outside? If the kids aren't out in the playground I don't hear them. Our preschool is actually insulated on account of the very cold winters here.
My argument is not, "he's right, but he didn't say it in Good Faith." My argument is the evidence in the video is not sufficient to support his claims. He didn't systematically eliminate other possibilities. It's going to backfire, because it's easy to just show children getting dropped off in these places and Voila! debunked.
Dropping children off in these places after a major expose doesn't debunk. The lack of children despite parents being in on it was the easily visible indicator of fraud that- having been explicitly identified- is easily rectified afterwards to obfuscate follow-on attention and allow motivated individuals to claim that children were always there.
The sort of motivated people who believe this sort of video 'debunks' are also the sort of people who wouldn't be persuaded by 'systematically eliminating other possibilities,' since motivated reason is under no obligation to conceed that other possibilities were properly eliminated based on whatever trivial grounds they have. They could even invent their own grounds of dismissal, like claiming that the videos were made on holidays or weekends where there would be no children.
It's not like such motivated reasoning against anti-progressive activist exposes are unknown. I'm sure you remember when the planned parenthood videos were dismissed as bad faith and misleading for editing techniques that many of the media organizations critiquing it were using, even as the activists posted the full videos which the media organizations rarely do and went out of their way to ignore in order to insinuate deception without, you know, showing the deception.
I don't believe that showing kids being dropped off debunks but it has equal weight as the Shirley video. That's the whole point.
I will say that I was surprised that the kids being dropped off knew where they were going. They weren't dragged in by their mothers. They walked calmly to the door as if they've done it before. First day drop off of all the daycare/preschools Ive seen were no where near as calm.
That's another example of the sort of motivated reasoning will let people accept and spread as a counter-veiling evidence and a basis to dismiss earlier information, yes. Appeals to personal credulity / experience are easy ways to implicitly dismiss something without having to formally make a claim- it's just another form of 'just asking questions' to raise skepticism, except without the quesitons.
Someone posts a video of a Marian Apparition. It could also be a weather balloon. Even if you believe the Marian Apparition is taking place, you might still be frustrated that the weather balloon video is what's blowing up and not the miraculous healing of an amputated limb documented by 12 medical personnel.
It's like the Right is deliberately strawmanning itself. I don't have to like it.
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