‘Fear and paranoia.’ Grandson says Andrew Lester bought into conspiracies, disinformation

‘Fear and paranoia.’ Grandson says Andrew Lester bought into conspiracies, disinformation​

https://www.kansascity.com/news/local/crime/article274517706.html
Andrew D. Lester, 84, shot Yarl twice — including once in the head — when Yarl accidentally went to the wrong house on Thursday night while trying to pick up his younger brothers. Lester, a white man who police say shot Yarl after the teen rang Lester’s doorbell, was charged Monday with first-degree assault and armed criminal action. He surrendered to authorities on Tuesday, was released on $200,000 bond and pleaded not guilty Wednesday during his first court appearance. The shooting sparked a national conversation on race and guns. “I feel terribly for him,” Ludwig, 28, said of Yarl. “And I’m really glad that he’s doing OK, he’s going to live. I know his life is changed forever. And I’m really sorry.”

“But in the last five or six years or so, I feel like we’ve lost touch,” he said. “I’ve gotten older and gained my own political views, and he’s become staunchly right-wing, further down the right-wing rabbit hole as far as doing the election-denying conspiracy stuff and COVID conspiracies and disinformation, fully buying into the Fox News, OAN kind of line. I feel like it’s really further radicalized him in a lot of ways.” Ludwig said his grandfather had been immersed in “a 24-hour news cycle of fear and paranoia.” “And then the NRA pushing the ‘stand your ground’ stuff and that you have to defend your home,” he said. “When I heard what happened, I was appalled and shocked that it transpired, but I didn’t disbelieve that it was true. The second I heard it, I was like, ‘Yeah, I could see him doing that.’” Does he consider his grandfather a racist? “I believe that there have been some positions that he’s held that have been bigoted or sort of disparaging,” Ludwig said. “But it’s stock Fox News, conservative American stuff. It’s ‘anybody who gets an abortion is a murderer.’ And ‘fatherless Black families are the reason why crime exists in this country.’ It’s stuff everybody’s heard at the Thanksgiving table every year.” Ludwig said his grandfather’s paranoia had accelerated in the past couple of years.
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Well, Amen to all of that! This man's grandson just told the Fox watchers in this country what we have been warning them about for over 7 years.

And people are always assuming I hate Fox News because it's conservative. It has nothing to do with it's politics. I hate Fox News because they're creating a mindset like this guy--and all of it is based on a lie. All of it. Even if the facts are accurate, the spin and blame-game are awful for this country.

They are toxic and poisonous propaganda. I despise them.

...and it is precisely twisted propaganda like this that has fueled the fires of extreme leftists the world over, being eerily reminiscent of language adopted by the Maoist red guards preceding their torturous "struggle sessions" to coerce compliance.

EdwinWillers said:

...and it is precisely twisted propaganda like this that has fueled the fires of extreme leftists the world over, being eerily reminiscent of language adopted by the Maoist red guards preceding their torturous "struggle sessions" to coerce compliance.

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I would like a source from which you have drawn your conclusion. This story came straight from the grandson of the shooter. It's not propaganda, it's a fact. The man was made to be paranoid by Fox lies, just as you have been made paranoid by Fox scare tactics. Where are the "extreme leftists the world over"? Show me the articles where some child was shot for ringing someone's doorbell. Or three teenagers attacked with a lethal weapon because they pulled into the wrong driveway. These people were the victims of a decade-long propaganda fear-fest intentionally created by a television network that values money over the life of innocent people.

Every incident of public threats and violence against innocents has been committed by far-right extremists like Cesar Sayoc the guy who mailed bombs to members of Congress because he thought they were treating Trump unfairly. David DePape who broke in the Pelosi home and cracked Paul Pelosi over the skull because he wanted to kill Nancy Pelosi because Fox and other far-right wingnuts in Congress had demonized her and made him hate her. Then there were the thousands who stormed the Capital because Trump told them to just to tear down democracy, so Trump could remain in power as an autocrat. I can name many more high profile cases of violence perpetrated by far-right QAnon inspired maniacs on the right. So don't dare to flip this around by trying to put the blame of this violence at the feet of anyone on the left. All you do is show that you have no defense for what the radical right has been doing for the past seven years.

EdwinWillers said:

...and it is precisely twisted propaganda like this that has fueled the fires of extreme leftists the world over, being eerily reminiscent of language adopted by the Maoist red guards preceding their torturous "struggle sessions" to coerce compliance.

Click to expand...

What kind of dressing do you want for that word salad? Good grief.

Lies have consequences. Fox to pay $785 million for those very lies. Those very lies that lead to the mind-set of the old grandpa. And he's not alone by a long shot.

HumblePi said:

I would like a source from which you have drawn your conclusion. This story came straight from the grandson of the shooter. It's not propaganda, it's a fact. The man was made to be paranoid by Fox lies, just as you have been made paranoid by Fox scare tactics. Where are the "extreme leftists the world over"? Show me the articles where some child was shot for ringing someone's doorbell. Or three teenagers attacked with a lethal weapon because they pulled into the wrong driveway. These people were the victims of a decade-long propaganda fear-fest intentionally created by a television network that values money over the life of innocent people.

Every incident of public threats and violence against innocents has been committed by far-right extremists like Cesar Sayoc the guy who mailed bombs to members of Congress because he thought they were treating Trump unfairly. David DePape who broke in the Pelosi home and cracked Paul Pelosi over the skull because he wanted to kill Nancy Pelosi because Fox and other far-right wingnuts in Congress had demonized her and made him hate her. Then there were the thousands who stormed the Capital because Trump told them to just to tear down democracy, so Trump could remain in power as an autocrat. I can name many more high profile cases of violence perpetrated by far-right QAnon inspired maniacs on the right. So don't dare to flip this around by trying to put the blame of this violence at the feet of anyone on the left. All you do is show that you have no defense for what the radical right has been doing for the past seven years.

Click to expand...

Source? The "source" on which you based this thread is an OPINION. And not the opinion of the man's son, but the man's grandson. Source - pfft.

Answer us this - what prompted you to start this thread?

EdwinWillers said:

...and it is precisely twisted propaganda like this that has fueled the fires of extreme leftists the world over, being eerily reminiscent of language adopted by the Maoist red guards preceding their torturous "struggle sessions" to coerce compliance.

Click to expand...

Propaganda?

Maybe you want to hear it straight from his grandson's mouth.

The interview starts at around the 35 second mark

EdwinWillers said:

Source? The "source" on which you based this thread is an OPINION. And not the opinion of the man's son, but the man's grandson. Source - pfft.

Answer us this - what prompted you to start this thread?

Click to expand...

lf I thought starting a 1000 threads on the dangers of Fox News type propaganda would actually get through the thick red curtain of hatred adopted because of that propaganda, I'd start today.

Come out from behind the curtain, reality is much better than the lies about America being a 3rd world shithole fed to MAGA adherents.

EdwinWillers said:

Source? The "source" on which you based this thread is an OPINION. And not the opinion of the man's son, but the man's grandson. Source - pfft.

Answer us this - what prompted you to start this thread?

Click to expand...

What prompted me to start this thread? Do you ask that same question of any member who posts a thread that you don't agree with?

EdwinWillers said:

...and it is precisely twisted propaganda like this that has fueled the fires of extreme leftists the world over, being eerily reminiscent of language adopted by the Maoist red guards preceding their torturous "struggle sessions" to coerce compliance.

Click to expand...

What an odd kind of projection. It's specifically the fear propaganda that Fox spews out that created this extreme fear of the other. If not for Fox News, this death wouldn't have happened.

Liberal7360 said:

Propaganda?

Maybe you want to hear it straight from his grandson's mouth.

Click to expand...

That's the entire point of this thread - a grandson with a demonstrably far left ideology opining about his grandfather's [supposed] far right beliefs.

What the grandfather did was absolutely wrong - no one disputes that, including myself.

Propaganda? Absolutely - both on the part of the OP who chose to post the thread and who refuses to answer why (post #9), yet titled it "Fear and paranoia..." and on the part of a grandson whose take on his grandfather's actions is clearly and distinctly partisan and obviously biased, a take which the article focused almost exclusive on - giving but one brief snippet of other family member's reactions:


That's the sum total of "other opinions" published about the grandfather's actions; one sentence - where the leftist grandson's opinions constituted the entirety of the rest of the article:

• “I’ve gotten older and gained my own political views, and he’s become staunchly right-wing, further down the right-wing rabbit hole as far as doing the election-denying conspiracy stuff and COVID conspiracies and disinformation, fully buying into the Fox News, OAN kind of line. I feel like it’s really further radicalized him in a lot of ways.”
• Ludwig said his grandfather had been immersed in “a 24-hour news cycle of fear and paranoia.”
• “And then the NRA pushing the ‘stand your ground’ stuff and that you have to defend your home,” he said. “When I heard what happened, I was appalled and shocked that it transpired, but I didn’t disbelieve that it was true. The second I heard it, I was like, ‘Yeah, I could see him doing that.’”
• “I believe that there have been some positions that he’s held that have been bigoted or sort of disparaging,” Ludwig said.
• “But it’s stock Fox News, conservative American stuff. It’s ‘anybody who gets an abortion is a murderer.’ And ‘fatherless Black families are the reason why crime exists in this country.’ It’s stuff everybody’s heard at the Thanksgiving table every year.”
• Ludwig said his grandfather’s paranoia had accelerated in the past couple of years.

The whole article and the OP is just a bunch of hyper-partisan, egregiously biased propaganda that if anyone here on the right had posted something similar with different players, they'd be viciously excoriated for it; so the hypocrisy is also patently obvious.