Nice Folks

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Kamloops Hate Speech #WTFKamloops

Nice Folks are a problem: usually because their greatest aspiration is to be nice.
To be “nice”, they are specialists in “going along to get along” – or is that “getting along to go along”?  They’ll literally join any crowd; march in any parade; accept anything that’s going on around them to – well, to simply make sure they don’t stand out.  They just run their lives based on something called “Common Sense”; which they think means the same thing as “Reality”, and practice like a religion.  The fact that their common sense is simply a mix of myths and legends that they learned in school – or the movies – or on TV – doesn’t seem to intrude on them.  Common sense is easier that Google, and serves them to get through their lives; walking with the herd; not getting into any kind of trouble.

The picture above is an old one: a long-ago event in Indiana; a crowd of nice folks out on a hot evening in August – milling about, chatting and watching each other; spending the evening doing what nice folks do everywhere.  None of them are likely aware of the strange name of the State they live in – Indiana; or the fact that it was given the name “Indiana” because it was supposed to be the guaranteed-by-treaty-forever territory for Indigenous people who were pushed out of the states to the south and east of them.  Same goes for the state capital – Indianapolis; literally “City of the Indians”.  Nothing to do with these folks, or what they’re doing: just “Nice Folks” on an August night…

The same thing goes for Kamloops: surrounded by territory that is owned by the original Indigenous nations. It’s named by those nations – Tk’emlúps, “meeting of the rivers”; and a good percentage of its inhabitants have status as “Indian” according to the Indian Act, or have ancestors who were classified as “Indian”, or have friends and family who have Indigenous backgrounds.  The city has a strong Indigenous identity, so it’s therefore surprising when someone decides to post something like this on Facebook:

Here’s someone doing the usual thing that people do on “WTF – Kamloops”: posting something inflammatory to create an entertaining flame war; because they have nothing better to do.  The fact that it is a series of hateful and harmful statements doesn’t concern her: it’s just for a laugh and to see who will bite.  Because people will always bite – and the fans of WTF will always be entertained by trolling them.  It’s what passes for entertainment these days.

When the flame war happens; and OP finally – inevitably – gets threatened by someone who has in fact become inflamed by the inflammatory post, the poster paints herself as a victim after making a desultory pretense of an apology; but not before making it clear she’s got what she wanted: attention.

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“Threats on my kids lives”

Imagine that happening to you!  Pretty bad.

She eventually takes down the offending post: the post that was meant to offend; the post full of hateful statements that she know would get people upset.  I hope she reported the threat to the police.

Then this:

“It was a gooder“.  Does that sound like someone who – reportedly – has been in tears; frightened for her children’s lives?

Or does it sound a little like someone who is satisfied that she got exactly what she was looking for?  Because repeating hateful myths about people is something that passes for entertainment in Kamloops.

Or Kelowna – because, as it turns out, the OP actually lives in Kelowna; as people found out when they – quite easily – searched her information down on Google.

She’s one of those “Nice Folks”; lives with her family in Kelowna; participates with the PAC at her local school; “living the dream”.

However, that wasn’t always the case. Our OP has suffered, as she lets people know in her one-time blog:
Poor kid: she discovers that looking different – in any way – can make you a target; but doesn’t consider why the kids around her might be malnourished. Part of the picture becomes clear in her following statement:

So her answer to bullying was to become the bully.  And she was such a good bully, that she built her own clique: “Nice Folks” do that – for self-protection: an easy thing to do when you’re a kid and being bullied; something most folks grow out of.

We’ll spare you the rest of the blog – except to say on thing. If you’re planning on broadcasting hate speech to an audience of almost 11,000 people; whatever you do, don’t publish the names and ages of your kids.

It’s probably not a good idea at the best of times, because – the 21st century.

So now we have a motivation for ML’s post: simple old-fashioned bullying; posting hateful statements about a particular ethnicity so you can watch them squirm – and maybe let your friends join in the bashing.  Which is what happens here:

You’ll note that the person who comments in this thread has their name in a different font, indicating that they have been blocked from the group as a consequence of criticizing the poster’s behaviour.

And that the administrators have all jumped in to abuse the person who criticized the OP – even as they block him from commenting.

Consistent for WTF – Kamloops, where the moderators allow one another to say any old hateful thing – because “Free Speech”; but don’t allow anyone to criticize what they’re saying – the hateful myths and legends that they’re propagating – because “Free Speech for us, but nobody else”.  That’s what makes WTF an “echo chamber”;  a white supremacist echo chamber; a hate-speech site.

In fact, the administrators on this site are taking on this role:

He’s the guy in charge: the one who decides how everything is understood; who will be punished; who will be encouraged.  The fact that a whole ethnicity is being abused; that the libels and smears are false; that the anger of those abused people is completely understandable doesn’t concern these folks – because they are in charge; and doing exactly what they want to do.  They have each others’ backs: #IStandWith…

These are the administrators of WTF – Kamloops: none of them are still in high school; none of them – apparently – have any kind of cognitive problem that would make them incapable of understanding what they’re doing; but all of them regularly use their slight Facebook powers to defame and bully people – including very large groups of people who have traditionally been the targets for white supremacists.We’ve reached out to some of them to get their side of the story, but have been blocked – then reported so the profile is locked out.

So I guess that means that they have nothing to say on the subject.  However, they have reached out to some of the folks who sometimes share their articles with us – to make not-so-veiled threats against them.

Strange that they can’t just up and speak for themselves; unless – of course – they have control of who gets to speak; and who has to be silent.
Bullies.

Next week, we’ll be looking at some of these administrators: what their jobs and community roles are; why their activities might not be the best thing for the community they live in.

We’ll also be posting information about some of their most active current members; because it’s always useful to see what kind of person meets their high standards for membership. We know a lot of people in both communities and have contacts which might provide some interesting information: the School District, the Health Authority, the Courts – that sort of thing.

Surprisingly, a lot of them – and their followers – don’t live in Kamloops.  But we’ll leave that to our next story: a little history, and some little facts about who these nice folks are.

Next up: Nice Folks 2.0

Marion, Indiana: August 7, 1905
“Nice Folks”
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