I still continue to argue that the way these are framed make it look far more creepy than they were actually perceived. You are primed with the titles of the videos. Many have creepy music, or people telling you that you should find it creepy.
And then there’s just the fact that people tend to judge by their own comfort level. But that’s not how this works. Whether something is uncomfortable for the participants is based on how the participants feel, not how you would feel. You can’t assume he would treat you the same way as he does others, because real life has all these little interplays and testing to see what the comfort level is.
What I say to look for is how uncomfortable the people he interacts with are. And, yes, there are some examples where he clearly crosses the line and seems oblivious. But it’s not as bad as these videos make it out to be. And that’s without even getting into the cherrypicking aspect.
But even if I’m wrong and he really is as creepy as the videos make him seem, Trump is not even remotely in the same league. Trump is creepy because you don’t know how he might hurt you. You know he doesn’t think of you as a human, just an NPC in his video game. Every slimy aspect of his character oozes out of every interaction with him. Trump may not be Hitler, but he is creepy in the same way.
Nothing Trump has done has any bearing on what is, supposedly, under discussion here. Biden is a handsy, touchy-feely, creepy old bastard. Trump’s behavior does not excuse Biden’s. Biden’s behavior does not excuse Trump’s.
It provides an actual example of assaulting behavior. You’re welcome to be “creeped” by whatever – people touching, spiders, birds, whatever. But if we’re making a case that it’s a legitimate and objective problem, something more than loaded videos should be considered. If we’re comparing it to MeToo and the recent awareness of improper behavior, the obvious disconnect is a lack of people alleging improper behavior from Biden.
Whatevs. It looks more like trying to defend Biden by directing attention to somebody ostensibly worse, to me. I wouldn’t want either Biden or Trump pawing my daughter. YMMV.
Since I wasn’t talking to TRM, you may wish to rethink that. Or not. Either way, Trump’s creepiness and vulgarity has no bearing on Biden’s “funny uncle” ways.
Well, the thread is about Biden’s behavior so anyone responding will be classified as “agreeing that it’s omg creepy” or “trying to defend Biden”.
If mentioning Trump gets you upset, I can still say “Eh, videos designed to elicit a response don’t mean much to me and Biden hasn’t had people alleging poor behavior in this #MeToo era which makes me think the supposed instances are cherry picked and overblown”.
Everyone else is making the comparison because it was brought up by someone arguing the other way. No, I don’t need to rethink anything. You’re wrong about “what it looks ike”.
No, “everyone else” is making the comparison because Biden, despite his manifest creepiness and his history of plagiarism, has become an elder statesman of sorts within my party. This is knee-jerk politics, nothing more. It’s just that, despite a lifetime of voting D, I have never liked or trusted Joe “Hands” Biden. I won’t defend him. His smarmy creepiness reflects on him and on the people who (would) vote for him. I refuse to be one of his enablers.
I am not much of a Biden fan, but nothing I saw (I didn’t watch much) struck me as over the line. OK, he hugged some colleague’s wife, and he put his arm around some pretty girls. No tongues, no ass-grabbing, nothing sexual.
I am all for empowering women and boundaries and all that, but it didn’t look to me like his attentions were unwelcome in the form they took. Is it victim-blaming to say that if they didn’t want to be hugged, they can gracefully escape the attempt (the first time) and then not gracefully if he persists? Yeah, it’s a gray area, but not that dark a gray. IMO.
I don’t even know if it is generational. An absolution prohibition on touching anyone except (I suppose) your wife or your young children does lose something. Yes, the idea is certainly open to abuse. But that doesn’t mean it can never be appropriate.
Maybe we should never touch each other. But ISTM that we will lose something if we do, to offset the things we gain.
It would be nice if we could ever talk about anything without bringing up Trump, but I ain’t holding my breath.
In your own words, “Whatevs”. If you need to convince yourself that everyone else is just making excuses rather than, you know, we’re not all repulsed by innocuous stuff you’ve decided is “creepy” then go with whatcha gotta do.
I was thinking about this again today. I grew up in an extended family that was low on the touchy-feely scale. Really low. There were however aunts, one on each side, that were much more huggy-kissy. I wonder if my expressions on being smooched (as a youngster) by them at family gatherings might have been much the same as the girls and women in the linked vids. Agree that the music and tone of the videos is intended to make it seem as bad as possible. I guess I’m giving Uncle Joe the benefit of the doubt at least until someone makes a claim that he went beyond what’s shown in the videos.
I only watched the first, two-and-a-half-minute video, because this isn’t something I care enough about to devote a lot of time to. But I’m inclined to agree with BigT.
I didn’t see Biden doing anything that I’d consider inappropriate, let alone creepy, if the person he was doing it to was okay with it; and the video didn’t give me enough context to know whether that was the case or not.
People who comment on the tapes without watching all of them are simply afraid of what they may see.
Biden is a Class A CREEP. The evidence on tape is overwhelming. I don’t care if he’s a D or an R, (I’m neither), but any one who can watch these tapes and say they don’t see anything abnormal is a liar.
Look at the faces and actions of these girls. How about the young girl who is so upset by Biden’s actions that she has to yell, “Dad!”.
The parents of these girls don’t say anything because they know that if they did, their careers in government service would be OVER. That is why they keep silent. My favorite tape is one where Sessions (who I am not a fan of) slaps Biden’s hand away from his very young grand child.
For those of us who don’t want to spend hours wading through the videos because we’re “afraid of what we may see,” how about a direct link to the moments you find particularly objectionable?
There were 27,800 results on the link given in the OP.
I chose one (the very first one that popped up) to watch: I watched it in its entirety, and I am entirely satisfied that that particular video (half of which was editorializing) was representative of the rest. I’m not afraid of anything. I simply do not have the time to watch twenty-seven-thousand videos. There was nothing creepy in the video I watched. How many more do you think I have to watch to find something remotely creepy?
Listen with sound off if you feel the the voice in the video will influence your feelings too much.
But I know that you and others will say that there isn’t anything unusual about the way he has his hands all over these little and not so little girls. Its normal! And its only an illusion that these little girls seem to be uncomfortable when Biden had his hands on them and they wanted to get away. Its all photo shopped away. Trick photography is all it is. Biden never really touched them at all.
So now we have an actual woman in the Democratic party coming out and saying that when Joe Biden touched her she felt violated, and watching those same videos linked above triggered her as she felt he was doing the same to others. Apparently this isn’t the only person who’s come out about his either.
