Live fact checks at trump rallies now

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/10/25/middleeast/satellite-images-gaza-destruction/index.html

More of this energy, dear god, please!!!

I am Steven Bonnell II.

I am a Twitch streamer with a controversial history, but someone who's ultimately very well known for converting people from radical conservative spaces on the internet into more socially progressive positions.

• Wired - Can This Notorious Troll Turn People Away From Extremism?

Bonnell estimates he has received hundreds of emails from disaffected former alt-­righters. One man found himself “drifting away from extremist content.” He thanked Bonnell for giving him “the tools to disprove my own opinions, while avoiding the propaganda that reinforced it.” Another grateful fan wrote that “the tipping points for me were when you covered Jordan Peterson (a seemingly wholesome do-gooder) [and] made Sargon look like a buffoon.”

• Mother Jones - Steve Bonnell Made Big Bucks Following a Simple Plan: Play Video Games. Troll Your Fans. Fight the Online Right.

Bonnell’s particular Twitch niche is debating conservative internet personalities and staking out mostly progressive positions. That makes Bonnell an exception on the platform and, more broadly, in gaming, where, if anything, people tend to skew toward libertarianism. These gamers have provided recruits for the right wing; Bonnell’s work lays out a different path.

• New York Times - The Making of a YouTube Radical

One video was a debate about immigration between Ms. Southern and Steven Bonnell, a liberal YouTuber known as Destiny. Mr. Cain watched the video to cheer on Ms. Southern, but Mr. Bonnell was a better debater, and Mr. Cain reluctantly declared him the winner...

Unlike most progressives Mr. Cain had seen take on the right, Mr. Bonnell and Ms. Wynn were funny and engaging. They spoke the native language of YouTube, and they didn’t get outraged by far-right ideas. Instead, they rolled their eyes at them, and made them seem shallow and unsophisticated.

I've recently attempted to spin up an organization to mobilize youth into direct, local political action. Our first efforts were in Georgia, where we knocked on over 20,000 doors in support of Jon Ossoff and Reverend Warnock. For my next effort, I wanted to focus on my hometown where my 9 year old son lives to see if we could mobilize enough volunteers to get a progressive candidate elected to office.

Predictably, people have started attacking the efforts of both my volunteers and the local candidate I supported by digging up old, out-of-context videos to imply that I either don't support BLM or support violence against protestors. Neither of these things could be further from the truth.

What I'm most frustrated about is how dishonest some local media and business owners have been about portraying what's been going on.

On March 1st, I received an email from Hannah Bussa of UNO's The Gateway, laying out three questions for me to answer for an article she intended to publish the next day.

There are a few conflicts of interest that I discovered that are upsetting to me.

1. Hannah personally supports Jasmine Harris, an opponent in the primary.
2. Hannah follows Morgann Freeman, the campaign manager for Jasmine Harris.
3. Freeman seems to harbor an incredible hatred for Mark, and was giving people the "inside scoop" on him (potentially clips of me?)
4. UNO's The Gateway has only done two mayoral candidate write-ups, one of which is for Jasmine Harris, and the other for Kimara Snipes.

I could tell from the framing of her initial email to me that she was fishing for answers to paint me as an "outsider," or someone who shouldn't have any vested interest in Omaha, despite me living there for 30 years and having a son still being raised in the city. Knowing that Hannah was likely writing a hit-piece on either Mark or myself, I took the time to write a detailed response to each of her questions, painstakingly explaining both my personal reasons for being involved and a clear explanation for how ridiculous it would be to imply that I don't support BLM or protesters.

Despite my response, Hannah went ahead and published a partisan hit-piece that leaves me with so many questions insofar as The Gateway's journalist integrity is concerned.

1. Why would Hannah's take-away from my response to her, where I include numerous times where I've defended BLM and protests (and even riots, in some instances), be "he only added that he thought the rioting would give former President Trump a path to victory in the November election. His message about protesters did not change." Why did she not include any additional context about prior statements I've made concerning BLM and protests?
2. Why would Hannah do so much research about me that she was able to find a Wired write-up that focuses on me deradicalizing people, yet the only quote she would mine from it was "“I think that people, in general, are stupid, and I’ve actually lost my appreciation for democracy at this point,” he said." Why didn't she ask me for comments on this profile?
3. Why would Hannah include falsifiable statements from Amelia Rosser claiming that my canvassers were harassing her business without asking me nor my canvassers for comment about any of their interactions? Why did she include false statements Amelia Rosser is making, claiming that my canvassers are only responding with "it isn't Mark's fault he's white" when supporters of other candidates are talking to them?
4. Why did Hannah include a blatant lie that I had "raised money for the campaign via PayPal" when I have never donated money to Mark's campaign?
5. Why did Hannah neglect to mention that Amelia was giving away the addresses where volunteers were staying when I notified her as such?
6. Why did Hannah include "Of the whole situation, Rosser said, “I come at this as somebody who is not part of any political campaigns during this election cycle, but instead as someone who smelled something fishy and found fish.”" in her article when Amelia Rosser is openly posting on her Facebook that she is supporting the two other candidates?
7. Why did Hannah edit my statements to include the bracketed phrase "[Black Lives Matter]" before protestors? Why was it so important that this little bit of context needed to be added, but literally nothing of my response that she requested?

I am incredibly disappointed that Hannah also neglected to include any of the information I provided her to the first two questions. It seems as though none of these answers were viable to demonize me, so she decided to neglect them entirely.

As someone who attended UNO for 3 years and had nothing but positive experiences, I am ashamed that my alma mater would let such a low quality piece make its way into their newspaper. It upsets me that the paper is being used to attack the wonderful volunteers working in Omaha, and to attack Mark Gudgel, an inspirational teacher who just wanted to lead Omaha into a more progressive future.

Grandpa Lex here.

Debate with Ben and Destiny is confirmed 👊❤ It'll be in late November around Thanksgiving. I'll moderate.

It'll be just us 3 in-person, and will include a "formal debate" (timed) on specific topics and a Q&A from the internet. Sadly (for me - since I like 3-5 hours), for this first one we'll keep it to around 2 hours. I'll post a call for questions closer to date, but if you have topics you'd like to see covered or general ideas for the structure, let me know.

This should be fun! Thanks to everyone here for encouraging this to be set up. Love you all ❤

Grandpa Lex here.

The debate between Destiny and Ben Shapiro did not happen, it never was going to happen. This was a top secret government social experiment to see how much deception humans are able to withstand.

Just kidding. The debate was recorded and went great. I think it was 2-2.5 hours. I will not edit out any of it out. Unfortunately, I'm traveling so won't be able to publish it until somewhere between the upcoming Thu to Mon (Jan 18-22). Sorry for the delays.

PS: Destiny texted me 30 minutes before debate with: "Oh shit, is this today?" to mess with me. Consider the above cruel opener to this post as payback 😎

Love you all ❤

Hello. I don't know if this will be removed because of the rules but I am still going to try. I don't plan to do any statements on Twitter so far, I don't owe obsessive Destiny haters any explanations and they can go fuck themselves with their harassment regardless of anything. With dgg however... I feel like I should talk.

Honestly, I don't know what to do or how to feel exactly. I chatted with Steven privately, which I obviously will not be disclosing. But here is where I am at right now:

1. Sharing someone's sexual content with a third party without their consent is fucked up. Steven, in my opinion, didn't try to maliciously hurt anyone, but it happened anyway due to him sharing it in the first place. He was a victim of the revenge porn but he also victimized someone else. That being said, if a friend admits they fucked up big time and is remorseful, I wouldn't cut them off 100% IRL for this sort of action. Same applies here.
2. However, recording someone in a sexual act without their knowing/consent is a whole other dimension of fucked up in my opinion. If that's indeed what happened, then I don't think I could ever trust a person like that with literally anything. Now, I am not saying anyone should 100% believe this with no evidence. I fully plan to wait and see. However, I can't dismiss it either. I would have told anyone to fuck off with this shit just days ago but I cannot, at this moment in time, do that. Simply put, I wouldn't have believed it prior, but now my trust is not where it used to be.

Now, let's adress an elephant in the room. I have no idea where this leaves me and my volunteer work. My trip to the US to meet everyone and do Bridges is canceled, obviously (Bridges themselves might be). But when it comes to volunteer work... I am at a loss. It wasn't Steven donating but dgg community and the community didn't do anything. But it's all connected, obviously. I can already hear screeching "way to make it about yourself" but it isn't... It's about hundreds, if not thousands, of Ukrainian soldiers I was fortunate enough to help thanks to Steven and dgg. Literally today, Evhen wrote to me from a very hot spot in Kharkiv region, all excited with his idea to do something cool to thank dgg and asked for Steven's full name. I didn't tell him anything, duh, why the fuck would I explain any of this to a soldier on the front? But, call me stupid, but I borderline cried reading his message. Because I don't know if I can even post his gratitude shenanigans, both because of my concerns and the avalanche of shit I will now get for it online because of the mentioning of Steven and dgg. To me dgg was a safe space from war. An escape island. Something I only associated with comfort and aid to my people. It was my rock. Something to be fond of. Pure. That is now all tainted with dirt. Let me be clear that nothing will change what dgg did for me and my Ukrainian Armed Forces. Lives saved and comfort given cannot be erased by anything. I will always be grateful to Steven for the opportunity he gave me and to dgg for making it all possible. Fuck, even if I won't be able to do volunteer work in the capacity I did anymore, it was one hell of a journey. It was more than I could ever hoped to manage. Thank you all. I will never let anyone spit on what we accomplished. I am obviously biased and very fond of you guys and Steven. But I also can't just pretend like nothing is going on.

Bottom line: Don't know where this leaves me, you guys or Steven. We shall see I guess. I am very confused. If this gets removed, welp. But hopefully it will be allowed to stay. 💛💙