In which the pond indulges in yet another groupthink bestial embrace ...

The Terrorists at the ready today, alert and alarmed, and their fearless leader is coming to the reptiles of Oz by the end of this week, so that the paranoid tabloid Terrorist mentality might rule the world ...

Which brings the pond to the subject of the kool aid and the group think ...

Now 'groupthink' isn't exactly George Orwell, but if you Greg Hunt it, one of the popularisers of the word certainly acknowledged a debt to George:

I use the term groupthink as a quick and easy way to refer to the mode of thinking that persons engage in when concurrence-seeking becomes so dominant in a cohesive ingroup that it tends to override realistic appraisal of alternative courses of action. Groupthink is a term of the same order as the words in the newspeak vocabulary George Orwell used in his dismaying world of 1984. In that context, groupthink takes on an invidious connotation. Exactly such a connotation is intended, since the term refers to a deterioration in mental efficiency, reality testing and moral judgments as a result of group pressures. (here)

Now the pond is deeply aware of affiliate laws related to Godwin's Law:

Arken's Law states: "A discussion is over when present society is compared to George Orwell's Oceania in the book 1984." The exact history of the law is debatable, but it is claimed that Arken's Law has its roots in the days of HTML 1.0 and earlier (such as Usenet). Any accusations of Big Brotherism, utilizing newspeak, practicing doublethink, thought policing, sending updates down the memory hole or belonging to the Anti-Sex League would all be invocations of Arken's Law. (here)

But the lure of a walk on the wrong side of the law is irresistible, especially when it comes to Chairman Rupert ...

...leaders often have beliefs which are very far from matching reality and which can become more extreme as they are encouraged by their followers. The predilection of many cult leaders for abstract, ambiguous, and therefore unchallengeable ideas can further reduce the likelihood of reality testing, while the intense milieu control exerted by cults over their members means that most of the reality available for testing is supplied by the group environment. This is seen in the phenomenon of 'groupthink', alleged to have occurred, notoriously, during the Bay of Pigs fiasco, or the writing for and publication of Rupert Murdoch's newspapers, especially in the matter of climate science.

Oh okay, the pond added that last bit, but see how naturally and easily it flowed ... with nary a hint of disruption to the meaning ...

Let us remember his master's voice ...

Okay, the pond is now up to tackling the dog botherer, and the piquant notion that an adoring groupthinker is the right sort of person to attack others for groupthink:

Yes, of course, the notion that the dog botherer has some connection with "reality" is intrinsically absurd and delightful, especially on the days when he remains deep in the grip of his ongoing obsessive compulsive, paranoid and deeply bitter relationship with his construct of the ABC, as if it's some gigantic block of conformity in which all individuality has been blotted from the landscape by ideological rigour.

On the matter of global warming, you might wonder why hundreds of delegates have turned up in Paris - it would seem that the ABC's groupthink has somehow manifested itself around the world, and in all sorts of strange places, including Russia and China.

You might also marvel at a scribbler parroting the words of Greg Hunt and Tony Abbott with a cheerful dogmatism - with nary a critical cloud or word in sight - and wonder at the way he can still accuse others of groupthink.

Parrots of the world, unite in your self-belief.

You also need a capacity for enormous self-delusion to become a certified, genuine dog botherer, so let's see how it's done this week:

The best guide to the kool aid drinker purporting to be objective is the way certain terms are trotted out, what you might call the "agnes dei" of the group thinker determined to deny their status as an adept group thinker.

There are ritual nods to the altar - gays and Islam are always good - and "climate alarmism" is always a winner ...

But let us go on and finish with the dog botherer as quickly as he will allow ...

And at that point the communication sputtered out, leaving the pond to guess what it all meant...

Presumably this means that no one should give a flying fuck about the mental health of Mal Brough, or even that epic paranoid depressive, the chocolate cake man ...

Well let's see how the dog botherer himself stayed true to the notion that we want people to exhibit their resilience and keep their trials in perspective, and not to stray from the political and get agitated about a little satire...

Kenny, who is also a commentator on Sky News, lodged the case after the ABC refused to apologise. His lawyers have argued the show was defamatory because it implied he had sexual intercourse with a dog and was low, contemptible and disgusting. 
In trying to have some of the defamatory imputations struck out, barrister Richard McHugh SC, representing the ABC, argued that just because something was satirical, it was not necessarily defamatory. 
He said no reasonable person watching the program would have interpreted an edited image with the caption "Chris 'Dogf***er' Kenny" to mean that Kenny really did have sex with a dog. 
In the Supreme Court, Justice Robert Beech-Jones struck that part of the case out, but rejected the ABC's challenge to other elements. 
The matter can now proceed to trial if it is not settled out of court. 
The judge agreed to give Kenny's lawyers seven days to file an amended statement of claim. 
Justice Beech-Jones said "there is little doubt the segment was distressing, even if not defamatory". (here)

Oh FFS, harden the fuck up ... is that resilience and keeping things in perspective?

And so to an alternative view ...

It was a response to an election-night suggestion from Kenny — a political commentator, News Corp Australia employee and former Liberal Party staffer — that the new Coalition government should cut the public broadcaster’s funding. The visual gag was crass, to be sure. A cheap shot. A dog act. But was it really so offensive? 
Chris Kenny is my dad. On one of the Sky News political analysis programs he hosts, he has replied to the Chaser joke, lamenting that if his children were ever to Google his name in the future, this is the kind of filth we would stumble across. 
Heaven forbid. 
Kenny is a staunchly neo-conservative, anti-progress, anti-worker defender of the status quo. He is an unrelenting apologist for the Liberal Party. He was one of Alexander Downer’s senior advisers at the time of the Iraq War. He’s been known to argue for stubborn, sightless inaction on climate change. He spits at anyone concerned with such trivialities as gender equality, environmental issues or labour rights from his Twitter account on a daily basis. Recently, he characterised criticism of the lack of women in Tony Abbott’s Cabinet as a continuation of the Left’s “gender wars”. He is a regular and fervent participant in The Australian’s numerous ongoing bully campaigns against those who question its editorial practices and ideological biases. The profoundly irresponsible, dishonest, hate-filled anti-multiculturalist Andrew Bolt has recently referred to Kenny on his blog as “a friend”. 
And it’s a jokey picture of a bestial embrace that I should be afraid of discovering online? 

Oh indeed... and Junkee the rest here ...

Just time then for a cartoon, knowing that if the dog botherer says that direct action is working a treat, without bothering to provide any supporting evidence, why then it surely must be working in such a clever way that actual emissions are scheduled to rise ...

Now there's knockdown resilience for you ... (and more Wilcox here ...)