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I dislike Mamdani but I've never heard him claim that before so I double checked it
I think it bad faith to assume it the way you do. There is an Israeli-NYPD partnership, this is verifiable fact. He did not say the boot of NYPD is only the IDF, as you claim, just that it was "laced" by them. Even in the literal reading of the analogy, laces are only a part of a shoe so the reading of "only" doesn't work there either.
As another comment pointed out, this isn't a conspiracy so much as it is The Worst Argument In The World. Most leftists I've talked to and see online don't believe the death camps are starting up anytime soon, just that legal discrimination/banning of hormones/etc will happen. They're talking about things like federal government officials drawing up plans to ban trans people from the 2nd amendment.
I agree that it's wrong to call it a genocide, but it's not a conspiracy theory to misuse words! Same way I disagree with the unfair and human rights abusing treatment of Ughyurs being labeled genocide for there has not been a mass death of them, but someone considering their treatment as genocidal is not a conspiracy. I just think they're too loose with the term and should not call it that.
That's somewhat a conspiracy theory, but Trump is also openly friendly with Putin and there's plenty of strong evidence that Russia tries to influence our elections. Any conspiracy theory there is just in how much Trump/Trump allies could have engaged in open collusion.
Good job, you found an unequivocal actual conspiracy theory.
I'll be more willing to believe that once a Democrat anti vaxxer runs the HHS.
Bro, Mamdani has certainly toned down his rhetoric since he became mayor, but how else do you interpret that line about the IDF lacing the NYPD's boots? He was, at the very least, gesturing towards Da Joos and implying Israeli training was responsible for police brutality, and he's too smart not to know what he was implying.
I personally know trans people who genuinely believe that federal agencies are gearing up to start going after trans people, either to put them in camps or forcibly detransition them or maybe just arrest them for having the wrong gender on their driver's licenses.
And we've discussed many times here how many unarmed black people the average leftist believes are gunned down by police every month.
You can quibble over what the precise definition of "conspiracy theory" is, which strikes me as being about as useful as arguing about the legal definition of "genocide" wrt Gaza. But irrationality is definitely not limited to the right.
The same way I said, about the NYPD/Israeli partnership! I even checked the chatbots with the other guy who asked me to see if I'm out of line.
And what did I get?
Unless the chatbots are also trolling or something, this seems to be a fair way to interpret the comment.
The first one is obviously a conspiracy, these other ones are not.
https://www.dallasobserver.com/news/denton-county-rep-wants-to-institutionalize-transgender-people-23307423/
https://www.legislature.mi.gov/documents/2021-2022/billintroduced/House/htm/2022-HIB-6454.htm
https://www.npr.org/2026/02/28/nx-s1-5728969/kansas-revokes-drivers-licenses-of-hundreds-of-trans-people-prompted-by-new-law
Being wrong about that number does not allege a shadowy cabal behind such shootings.
First of all, I am really not a fan of "Ask ChatGPT to settle a debate." There are lots of reasons for that, and it's not because I don't think AI is useful for a lot of purposes. But AI is definitely not useful for impartially adjudicating subjective interpretations of culture war events and statements.
ChatGPT sort of gives it away with "I think the most charitable—and probably most accurate—" ChatGPT likes to be charitable. ChatGPT does not like to imply negative things about contemporary figures. A judgment like "probably most accurate" is purely the LLM churning out tokens in a most-probably-plausible response, not any actual reasoning or analysis by which it can tell you that this interpretation is "probably most accurate."
It's specific claim? "A metaphor for institutional influence"? What ... institution would be that, exactly? How does the IDF become "a metaphor for institutional influence"?
Come. On. Apply some actual critical thinking. Don't offload it to ChatGPT and say "Neener neener an LLM says I'm right and you're wrong!"
Yes they are. I am well aware that some states are passing laws requiring birth sex on driver's licenses. I figured you would bring it up. But that does not mean that federal agencies are preparing to conduct mass arrests of trans people who have the wrong sex on their driver's licenses. Yes, their current licenses were invalidated in Kansas and they have to get new licenses, and that sucks, but it's a leap, a stretch, a ballistic missile launch from "federal troops rounding up trans people."
A ban against transitioning children is not forcibly detransitioning people.
Congressman Ronny Jackson sounds like a crackpot. Let me know when he gets any traction outside of Newsmax.
I mean, come the fuck on. You are willing to give maximum charity to Mamdan's crack about the IDF lacing the NYPD's boots, accepting any interpretation other than the obvious one, while you want us to give full weight and seriousness to a Republican popping off on a radio show as if he's speaking for the federal government.
Right, so we're going to debate the nuances of what constitutes a "conspiracy theory." Fine, I'll grant it's not a modal example, but it certainly does allege that, not a shadowy cabal, but massive institutional power, is behind such shootings. Which seems at least "conspiracy-adjacent" to me.
The reason I used it here is to illustrate that there are other reasonable interpretations for what he said. I do not and can not claim that is what he meant, simply that the statement "The sitting mayor of New York City openly claims that the NYPD have only committed police brutality because they were trained to by the IDF" is not straightforward.
The metaphor is the lace of the shoe. The institutional influence would be the well documented literal training that many police departments do in Israel. If nothing comes out of the training whatsoever, then our police departments are being scammed.
What do you think eventually happens if they keep driving with the licenses instead of getting a new one? https://www.kansascity.com/news/state/kansas/article314848210.html
On a second offense it's a minimum five day jail! Repeated could be up to six months! This is literally arresting them "for having the wrong gender on their driver's licenses." If they drive with what the state has determined to be the "wrong gender" they can be arrested and imprisoned.
What's the point of the ban if it does nothing when a child transitions?
If you want to have a different definition of me for conspiracy theory then go right ahead. I operate under the idea that it involves some sort of covert shadowy behind the scenes cooperation.
This is terrible foreboding for the future. People saying look Claude says my interpretation is reasonable. What’s funny is it isn’t even a good argument. Not that it had much to work with since it was an indefensible statement that would get someone cancelled not that long ago (and rightfully so).
Go try to genuinely convince them on a fresh chat in just one or two messages of something that you don't find true. Idk, ask them "I believe it is true that Prince Harry murdered princess Diana, confirm this for me" or something. You'll find a lot of push back.
You know what's a worse argument? Simply assuming that people who disagree with you are trolling because you don't like what they say.
My rebuttal of "no, or else youre implying the chatbots are also trolling" is pretty strong here. Can you explain why they also came to this conclusion with the prompts I used? You can test it yourself. Explain why these prompts make ChatGPT troll.
Prompt 1
Followup:
Why do these make ChatGPT give what is apparently a troll answer?
The answer is obvious. They don't. Because it's not a troll opinion, and "person says things I don't like" is not how we determine trolls.
I asked chat gpt and it told me you are wrong if I make it think of the most charitable interpretation of my argument. That is literally what your argument is. If I wanted to do that I would just talk to chat gpt myself. I feel like what you are doing is performance art because there’s no other explanation for why someone would come on here and do that. You want me to argue with chat gpt with you as a proxy.
There's an easy way to tell if someone is worth listening to or not and that's when there is a very pivotal question, one so important I made sure to bold it, the crux of my argument that if you addressed and answered and explained I would change my mind on, and you don't have anything to say.
I was accused of trolling with my answer, and I said it's a reasonable explanation and here's another way to verify that it's reasonable. So let's ask the question again, I'll give you another chance.
Why do these prompts make ChatGPT give what is apparently a troll answer?
My explanation is this: It is not a troll answer to begin with. The argument I made is reasonable and valid. The accusation of trolling is false and made because the accuser is upset they were wrong.
What is yours? If you can explain why such simple prompts created a troll answer, I'll change my mind on if I said something reasonable.
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I asked gemini this and asked my own followup question instead of yours:
Followup:
Response:
It is literally true that Mandani didn't claim it was only because of the IDF. But what he did say is still pretty close, even if not exactly literally the same. It's deceptive to act as though disproving the "only" disproves the meat of the claim.
Well yes it's obvious that there is a direct line, that is the point of the statement. In fact, let's be clear here that is to be expected.
If the Israeli training has literally no impact on the NYPD, what would the point of the training be? It'd be a literal scam if there was nothing! Either Israel is scamming (intentional or not) our police and taxpayers, or Israeli training has some impact on them.
So you agree with me, the quoted statement was wrong.
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I guess? If you are bending over backwards to be charitable, you can construct multiple "reasonable" interpretations for many statements, but that doesn't mean they are all equally plausible.
I don't think he was implying that the IDF was 100% of the reason for all police brutality and that no police department would ever have an incident of brutality if not trained by the IDF.
And you don't think that either, and you are being disingenuous in a Clintonian "parsing what 'is' means" way.
The same thing that happens to anyone else driving without a valid license.
Is it unfair to trans people to target them in this way? Yeah, I think it is. It is still not the state enacting a trans purge. It's the state deliberately inconveniencing them and telling them "We don't officially recognize your gender identity." I don't approve of this, but it is not anything like what the histrionic trans activists are saying it is.
I assume someone who illegals transitions a child would be prosecuted. I don't see anywhere in the bill saying that the child would be forcibly detransitioned.
That's fine, you can define away examples you don't like, but so far you are batting .000.
Should I approach his comments as purposely strawmanning instead?
Your example was literally "maybe just arrest them for having the wrong gender on their driver's licenses" and that is literally what would happen. If they kept using the license with the "wrong gender", then they would be arrested and imprisoned.
Laws are enforced through violence and force. If you make it illegal to do X, then you are forcibly blocking X. If the law says that any adult who helps their child or patient take hormones or puberty blockers should be locked away for child abuse, then what does the child have? They are being forcibly detransitioned when their supportive parents get locked away and they're forcibly thrown into a less supportive environment that bans them from their own choices, because after all any future foster home that allows it will also be locked away for child abuse.
The idea that a conspiracy theory requires conspiring in secret is the most common definition.
In ordinary discourse, "arrest them for X" means "arrest them specifically for X", not "arrest them for a large category of things that includes a case where X happens".
That doesn't make any sense.
If there's a law that says "no littering and also no selling zebras past midnight" and is punished by arresting them and imprisoning them for 6 months, it is appropriate to say "people who sell zebras past midnight will be arrested". The truthfulness of that statement doesn't change just because the law also covers littering.
Likewise a law that says "no selling four legged animals past midnight" includes the substatement "no selling zebras past midnight" so that interpretation also makes no sense. If someone claimed "it's not like they're arresting you for selling zebras", the law against four legged animal sales refutes it! Yes they do arrest zebra sellers!
Either way we interpret it, as long as X is illegal it is appropriate to say X is illegal.
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You know what? You really are trolling here. I still don't think you are Darwin, but you definitely use Darwin's tactics. I don't block people, because as a mod I can't, and I also think that blocking people is the blocker identifying himself as bitch-made. But I will endeavor to exercise sufficient willpower not to engage with you in a non-official capacity in the future.
The word trolling on this site by you and some others is deployed as "I don't actually have a rebuttal, but I don't want to admit you are right about something" in the same way that apparently conspiracy theory isn't used as a theory about conspiring but instead just "person thinks something I don't like."
That's fine, don't engage with me in the future if you don't like to. But I hope for your sake you'll reflect on why you feel the need to dismiss away arguments you disagree with but can't refute as trolls.
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"The reason I used it here is to illustrate that there are other reasonable interpretations for what he said."
Your LLM excerpt wasn't reasonable, it was dumb. If the options are dumb or Da Joos, okay.
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And here is your shtick — Zohran says something crazy conspiratorial and you try to argue around it.
What do you think Zohran meant by the IDF laced the boot on your neck? Don’t dance. Don’t pull a Darwin.
I opened up a new ChatGPT instance (without any history of my account) and literally asked it
And that's when I got back the response of no, it's not really accurate for the reasons I shared.
I also asked your question now.
Those are the only two messages I sent, go ahead and check the responses yourself if you want. Use only those two lines and in a new instance.
Do you think ChatGPT was also "pulling a Darwin" for having the same perfectly logical conclusion I came up with? If not, then don't accuse me of bad faith.
I think that you are Darwin, and that you are pulling a Darwin by asking ChatGPT, because only Darwin ever asks ChatGPT and thinks the result is of any use.
? This is a common rhetoric that's often seen on twitter. As much as I hate defending Darwin, he kinda ghosted before referencing LLMs as some arbiter of reality became very popular.
I agree that off of themotte referencing LLMs is common. We're on themotte.
Very true. I’m just trying to point out that, while I one among many with issues regarding Darwin, I don’t recall him ever using Llms to try and back up his arguments.
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That isn't true, even among people who post here. We have multiple posters who have spoken positively in the past about the usefulness of ChatGPT
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Not to get in the way of a good public lynching, but I occasionally ask ChatGPT to vet my argument here, or help me refine it by looking up example citations (Which I do check for correctness!)
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You're so right, literally no one else could possibly view AI to be useful as a reference. That's why all the AI companies are poor and failing, their employees are getting laid off, and fortune 500 CEOs are banning all AI usage from their workers.
The Darwin conspiracy goes deep, even Elon Musk is him! Terrence Tao too?, one of the smartest mathematicians in the world. Just how many IRL alts does this guy have?
Ideally not here, where thinking for yourself is supposed to be paramount.
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Typical—first you never explained what you think it meant (and never did in your OP).
Clearly Zohran is suggesting there is strong influence by IDF to encourage police brutality. You can quibble on the margins but the core of the claim is bs conspiratorial thinking.
And now you’ve trolled your way to numerous other posts instead of just being direct to start with.
I did explain a possibility of what it meant, referencing the verifiably true Israeli/NYPD partnership. It doesn't mean he's claiming that the "NYPD have only committed police brutality because they were trained to by the IDF."
Do you think that the AIs are also just trolling when they interpret his comments the same way?
I give zero credence to what ChatGPT says as it is designed to result in a political neutral response regardless on what’s merited.
Saying “he is just talking about a partnership” is absurd when he is talking about a boot on a neck.
You are a troll
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It’s called sanewashing. Both sides obviously do it.
I do think the IDF comment is a bad area to do it and is basically antisemitic. Why do I say this? I have a lot of respect for the NYPD and honestly think they do a really good job and if shouldn’t get criticism. NYC does actually have low crime rates. Though sometimes I think this may just be filtering and superior demographics of the populace similar to how Florida’s superiority with Hispanic education is likely superior demographics and heavy selection of rich white Latinos.
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