If we get to call Bush a chimp then they get to call Obama a monkey. With all the racist meaning that implies.
And we lose the ground to call them out on it.
They’re going to call Obama a monkey anyway. And if we don’t fight back, they’ll see it as weakness and only do it more often.
The only thing they understand is retaliation and fear. We need to look them in the eye and laugh at them. Because they’re afraid of people laughing at them.
Yes, they are, and when you engage in the same juvenile name calling you are giving them all the cover they could ever want to continue to do it.
Ya remember, “When they go low, we go high”?
I just can’t imagine anyone listening to all the cutesy ‘nicknames’ the right has for, well, everyone and not realizing just how cringe it makes them sound.
I sure do. How’d that work out in 2016?
You tell me . . . and then explain how grade school taunting would have created a better result?
Well, the guy who did the grade school taunting got elected president.
True, this.
More and more, I hear the right using “Communist” and “Marxist” to describe Democrats generally, and this follows the pattern of dictatorships, whether potentially emerging or already established in power. In fascist Germany and Italy, opposition parties were banned because they were supposedly communist. During the era of Communist rule in eastern Europe, any honest opposition to the state was condemned as fascist,
In the last day or two neo-Nazis have displayed anti-Semitic banners in support of Kanye West from a bridge over I-405 in L.A., while giving the Nazi salute.
Stupid nicknames can have propaganda functions. They can reinforce false narratives/misinformation (that’s what the one of the op attempts to do); they can appeal to existing negative stereotypes and bigotries (see racist themed ones), or concerns that voters have (see “sleepy joe” etc.) A “good one” is catchy… usually with rhyming or alliteration. (Cleverness moves it from stupid to actual funny.)
The right has many false narratives and much misinformation to support. They win often by appealing to existing negative stereotypes and bigotries. Those are their strategies and stupid nicknames are an effective tactical match for them.
FWIW I suspect “Xiden” fails. Biden is too strongly and sometimes even clumsily hardline on China for the narrative to get far, and few can parse how even to pronounce it. Not catchy.
“Our side” is fighting misinformation and fighting against negative stereotypes and bigotry. The tactics that serve their strategies are counterproductive for ours. Humor OTOH can be an effective tool but it works, it bites, when it exposes and calls attention to actual serious truths with a laugh. The stupid Trump nicknames never did that. They just made the users look stupid. And validated further stupid name calling as what everyone does. They were spitting into the wind.
I don’t think that’s necessarily true. Trump is notoriously thin skinned. When he was mocked with silly nicknames, he would lose his temper and shout back at people. Calling Trump a short fingered vulgarian became a genuine campaign issue because of what it revealed about Trump’s character flaws.
Of all the attempts I’ll grant that that one actually came close, arguably crossing over into humor. How?
Because Trump’s crudeness, short temper, and vulgarity were, while attractive to some, serious concerns even among some who supported him. His publicly reacting with short tempered vulgarity, more to the physical imagery aspect than to the rest, only reinforced that message. The efficacy of the message though was not school yard punching back at a bully, trying to teach them a lesson, going low or lower back at ‘em … but highlighting a serious concerning truth about Trump with a laugh.
I think one thing with the nicknames is that there will be some people who agree they’re too childish, but still accept that they are accurate. Like “I’d never say that, but I admire they ‘speak their mind.’”
And that’s exactly my problem with the whole “speak their mind” paradigm. Doing so crudely should not be considered an honorable trait.