It’s not a “fun” anime video it was an explicit & vulgar depiction of Paul Gosar “slitting” AOC’s throat…
Instagram and Twitter reactive action of merely slapping a warning label is an abject failure of each social media company’s refusal to enforce their own rules.
To be clear I’m not a fan of AOC. However she has earned my respect for her incredibly concise & targeted questions during Congressional Hearings and how she’s comported herself being the repeated target by the GOP, MAGA and QANON. So yes on a personal level AOC does rub me the wrong way but I can still respect certain things about her.
Instagram v Twitter - Rep Gosar reach & engagement
Based purely on the data of impressions and engagement standpoint there are a few things I’d like to share with you. The Anime Video that Rep Gosar originally posted on his Instagram Account before he tweeted out the vulgar video. Below are a few data points that might interest you.
Within 90 minutes of his original Instagram post the video was viewed 556 times —the. reach of that video is now in excess of 16,483 views
Instagram clearly states Gosar’s video “does not violate” the Company’s terms of service. Frankly you have to click a lot of links to finally land on Instagram’s rationale/notice. As you can clearly see Instagram explicitly states Gosar’s post doesn’t violate their Terms of Service
Because the video Rep Gosar posted to social media actually depicts him “Slitting” AOC’s throat -notice the red splatter? That’s blood being depicted. This is not okay or funny and certainly Gosar’s “chill out guys it’s only a cartoon” is the defense of the indefensible.
Follow up question - what is Rep Gosar doing posting what’s obvious Chinese propaganda on his social media accounts?
Looking at the open source Twitter Data & then accessing the WayBack Machine -you’ll note that Gosar’s reach on Twitter far out paced his original Instagram post and by the time Twitter took any action his tweet reached hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of eyeballs…
NOVEMBER 7, 2021 Archive of his November 7th Tweet
November 8, 2021 various Tweet archives
NOVEMBER 9, 2021 various archives & Twitter’s enforcement (or lack there of) action -
01:32:21 = 7,354 Retweets and 34,450 Likes
05:58:32 - at some point Twitter decided to slap the following warning label on his Tweet -while acknowledging that Gosar’s tweet did violate Twitter’s Terms of Service
17:21:34 because Twitter identified Gosar’s engagements are no longer functional
19:50:39 “ “
November 10, 2021 Archive -note the enforcement action -alternatively Gosar could have changed the settings of his tweet.
Had Gosar not included that six seconds of a disgusting and disgraceful anime video. What that Twitter & Instagram Data shows is the amplification of this profoundly disturbing tweet. And by amplification I am talking about the thousands of retweets and likes. And I generally believe this data suggests and affirms that the social media companies are unwilling to proactively enforce their Terms of Service and their enforcement is lack luster because Twitter, Instagram, Meta (Facebook) reacted to the public outcry yet Gosar is still on their various platforms. To be fair Gosar did eventually delete his tweet but the fact is Gosar was establishing a predicate with his Nov 7th Tweet. He literally pinned the onus on his office staffers.
In the Court of Public Opinion, it depicts him murdering a fellow member of Congress. It is unseemly, unethical and frankly incompatible with how members of Congress should conduct themselves. And frankly Madam Speaker is correct:
“Threatening other officials is a Class D or C felony, usually carrying maximum penalties of 5 or 10 years pursuant to 18 U.S.C. §875 and/or 18 U.S.C. 876.. more importantly though is 18 U.S.C §351. Congressional, Cabinet, and Supreme Court assassination, kidnapping, and assault…
Threats Against Members of Congress -FBI Vault 2000-2010
Can be found via https://vault.fbi.gov/threats-against-members-of-congress
Public figures are often the targets of threats of violence. The FBI is charged with investigating many of these threats, especially when they are made against federal officials. This release details a number of threats made against members of the U.S. Congress between 2000 and 2010. This is not a complete collection of such threat investigation materials, but consists of the opening and closing ECs (electronic communications or case memoranda). The files do not include any material related to ongoing investigations. This release has been previously made available under FOIA requests. In 2010, the ECs concerning threats made between 2000 and 2008 were released; the ECs concerning threats made between 2009 and 2010 were released in 2011.
US Capitol Police (USCP) post Jan6th
There is a bit of misinformation out there, the USCP are charged with protecting members of Congress but that’s only while the members of Congress are in DC -when Members of Congress return home - their police protection is handed off to the local (State, City or County) Law Enforcement, who have jurisdiction. In May of 2021 the US Capitol Police -Office of Inspector General made several recommendations (see 4 page executive summary) —both in terms of appropriations and staffing. Pursuant to Public Law (P.L.) 109-55, the USCP Office of Inspector General (OIG) initiated an investigation surrounding the January 6, 2021 Act of Domestic Terrorism. The USCP-OIG objectives for this review were to determine if the Department;
..established adequate measures for ensuring the safety and security of the Capitol Complex as well as Members of Congress,
..established adequate internal controls and processes for ensuring compliance with Department policies, and
complied with applicable policies and procedures as well as applicable laws and regulations.
The scope included controls, processes, and operations surrounding the security measures prior to the planned demonstrations and response during the takeover of the Capitol building.
In defense of AOC and other members of Congress targeted by Trump-MAGA-QANON…
Again I have been harshly critical of AOC -it wasn’t until someone pointed out that my criticism of her might actually amplify the disgusting hateful misogynistic attacks on her —only then did I realize that I might have contributed to the uncivil discourse. So I decided to pull back and give AOC a second look and to give her the benefit of the doubt…
Unfortunately the facts show that people like Rep Gosar consistently act in a manner that is incompatible to a “civilized society” because as Rep Lieu eloquently stated:
…This is sick behavior from Rep. Paul Gosar. He tweeted out the video showing him killing Rep. Ocasio-Cortez from both his official account and personal account. In any workplace in America, if a coworker made an anime video killing another coworker, that person would be fired.
Numerous death threats made towards AOC..
January 19, 2021 the Department of Justice unsealed a complaint as to Defendant Garrett Miller, found here
Brendan Hunt, also known as “X-Ray Ultra,” with threatening to murder United States officials;
DOJ-OPA Announcing the arrest & charges
Brandon Hunt criminal complaint
or via my Scribd Account (trust me on this read the whole. sentencing memo - you’ll note Defendant Hunt is now blaming AOC and it’s the worst kind of jurisprudence subterfuge I’ve read in a long time. Which starts in earnest on page 14 —
At the center of the Government’s case was a video Defendant Hunt posted on BitChute on January 8, 2021 entitled "KILL YOUR SENATORS" with the summary "Slaughter them all," wherein Defendant stated, among other things:
We need to go back to the U.S. Capitol when all of the Senators and a lot of the Representatives are back there, and this time we have to show up with our guns. And we need to slaughter these motherfuckers . . . [O]ur government at this point is basically a handful of traitors ... so what you need to do is take up arms, get to D.C., probably the inauguration ... so called inauguration of this motherfucking communist Joe Biden ... [T]hat's probably the best time to do this, get your guns, show up to D.C., and literally just spray these motherfuckers ... like, that's the only option ... [T]hey're gonna come after us, they're gonna kill us, so we have to kill them first ... [S]o get your guns, show up to D.C., put some bullets in their fucking heads. If anybody has a gun, give me it, I'll go there myself and shoot them and kill them ... [W]e have to take out these Senators and then replace them with actual patriots . . . [T]his is. a ZOG government . . . [T]hat' s basically all I have to say, but take up arms against them….
On November 9, 2021 Defendant Hunt’s Defense Attorney filed the following sentencing Memo (ECF-EDNY or via Scribd) -his Federal Public Defender believe their client has already served “enough time” and that Defendant Hunt is not the same person who made numerous death threats, including to AOC - stating in part:
…purposes of incarceration have already been accomplished in the time he has served…
…Mr. Hunt has served 10 months in prison at the MDC Brooklyn, a jail that has become singularly notorious for hard time. He has lost freedom, a job, his reputation. Yet he has emerged a far different man than the one who came into the criminal justice system on January 19, 2021, and we believe that the purposes of incarceration have already been accomplished in the time he has served.
We believe that a 10 month sentence with appropriate supervision and treatment to follow…Mr. Hunt is a very different man today than the one who posted the “Kill Your Senators” video and took it down a few hours later. He testified he wants to be a peacemaker, and his digital footprint supports that this is his ideal.
During the. April 2021 trial, Defendant Hunt stated the following and I instantly thought of Trump’s “locker room talk” because Defendant Hunt… well here you can read what he stated during his trial and how his Federal Public Defender uses Defendant Hunt’s own words as a pretext to “he’s a totally different man —he found God and…” before they argued the classic Trump “both sides” Defense (see page 4 of Defendant Hunt’s sentencing memo)
“I had been listening over the last two years to a lot of rhetoric. A lot of political rhetoric on both sides of the aisle. I spent a lot of time listening to the news 24 hours a day almost and getting wrapped up in it. If I had to describe what was going through my mind at the time, I felt like I was in sort of a football stadium where the democrats and the republicans were really slugging it out and tackling each other, and it was getting rough and I felt like. And I felt like I was in the stands with everybody drinking beer saying, yeah, yeah, millionmilitiamarch, you know… I didn't really take it seriously any more than a sports fan would say, yeah, I want the Yankees to murder the Red Sox or something. And then all of a sudden I felt like the lights in the stadium went out and the spotlights all came on me.”
..The painfully ugly level of discourse reached in the political realm cannot be denied…
The painfully ugly level of discourse reached in the political realm cannot be denied. It predated the tweets of former President Trump. Whether from the “right” or the “left,” the days of polite and reasoned speech, even in moments of national stress and tragedy, are seemingly gone.
It’s not until you reach page 5 et seq of Defendant Hunt’s sentencing memo, that you can see how Defendant Hunt’s state of mind or at the minimum the contributing factors that acted as a catalyst for Hunt’s rationale of sending death threats.. but in particular see page 6 -herein Defendant Hunt actually pivots to
…President Trump’s rhetoric has made it “more acceptable among more people to denigrate and attack other human beings”…
Mr. Hunt testified, the rhetoric crossed the aisles. Experts have noted that former President Trump’s rhetoric has made it “more acceptable among more people to denigrate and attack other human beings.” …“Conservative websites and political leaders, especially at the state and local level, now regularly use violent rhetoric and demonize their political opponents.”
As previously explained I’d like to draw your attention to page 6, the first paragraph of Defendant Hunt’s Sentencing Memo - he then seeks to blame & draw a correlation between three current members of the House of Representatives & their violent rhetoric essentially being “the norm” …which reads in part:
“The use of violent rhetoric has grown more mainstream in right-wing circles, from conservative websites and think tanks to congressmen like Louie Gohmert and Madison Cawthorn.”… None of the aforementioned individuals, who are well-known and have dedicated followings, have recanted or apologized for making these statements or been criminally prosecuted.
This incendiary rhetoric by political leaders has shifted discourse norms in our country.
Again I’m not a big fan of AOC but I respect her -especially during various Congressional Hearings. She’s proven herself that she can hold her own. But the point is many of the attacks and threats made to members of Congress;
typically attacking a female member of Congress
a vast majority of the targets are female and women of color
the misogyny and sadistic attacks incompatible with our form of self governance…
Shortly after the Jan6th Domestic Terror Attack (yes I believe Jan6th was a domestic terror attack and Donald Trump with ample amplification from ultra conservative news organizations —resulted in the radicalization of thousands (possibly millions) of Trump Supporters. Until we as a society accurately state what Jan6th was:
Jan 6th was Domestic Terrorism
..then we as a civilized society will not fully appreciate and comprehend the totality of Donald Trump, GOP, QANON, MAGA obvious radicalization which resulting in thousands of Americans following the orders of their leader
Again AOC, the Squad, Pelosi and Schumer has been the constant target of QAON-MAGA-GOP with no end in sight. In February 2021 AOC’s Instagram Live Q&A was incredibly brave and AOC has solidly earned my respect.
Keep in mind I only spent a few hours researching but I’ve previously written numerous articles concerning the safety of members of Congress, found here —the bottom line is Paul Gosar should be expelled from the House of Representatives chamber. Period. Full Stop.
Other reporting and data resources:
“…The acting chief of the U.S. Capitol Police says there has been a more than 93% increase in the number of threats received by members of Congress in the first two months of this year compared with the same period last year.”
June 15, 2021 Attorney General Merrick B. Garland Remarks: Domestic Terrorism Policy Address
September 21, 2021 FBI Director Wray Congressional Testimony -Threats to the Homeland: Evaluating the Landscape 20 Years After 9/11
The threat is literally coming from “inside the House”…
and the fact that Kevin QANON McCarthy continues to be silent —it’s a factual assumption that his silence signals; threats from the House’s GOP-MAGA-QANON caucus will continue with impunity….
And your reward for slogging through this article -I’m taking the rest of today and tomorrow off because writing while on pain meds is a recipe for spelling & grammar lalapalooza…
I’ll be back soon - Filey
Thank you! Gosar and Gomer (so) should not have their jobs, and social media companies are definitely making the rhetoric in this country worse. It's interesting how trump is being called out for essentially brain- washing these people. Regardless, ten months is not enough for the kill the senators chump.
You wore spot on about the roller coaster ride with the National Archive debacle. It's frustrating.
May you feel much better soon! Hugs
Wishing you well Filey. These are horrible, terrible, very bad people backed by huge money. This week has me in a less than hopeful place but I won’t allow myself to stay there very long. This is war and we’re fighting on so many different fronts against hateful people who have a plan and it’s a coordinated effort. Ugh. Blessings to our President and VP.