Why is it only bad optics when Democrats do it? You’re saying that the Democrats are looking worse, compared to Trump, because left-wing internet randos like me are using the same sort of language used by the Republican president-elect.
Do you see the vast asymmetry there?
Again with the double standard. My wife and I are a little stressed because we’re unsure if some medication or certain procedures are going to legal next year. These people are standing on my neck but when I punch back it isn’t good for optics? You should probably consider which side you’re on, because this attitude favors MAGA. They can spew whatever garbage they want but as soon as someone throws it back in their face it’s bad optics.
It may be that there is an asymmetry caused by me simply being too far away from things, and my taking a quick snapshot of a situation that you have been embedded in for far deeper and longer than I - and with far greater stakes than me. I really wouldn’t dare to engage anyone - yourself included - on the intricacies of American politics. You, I am sure, know a lot more than me. I concede that I may be completely off-base with my interpretations.
My commentary here is just about the tenor of communication, rather than the content itself. Everyone in the world has heard Trump speak, and knows what he is capable of saying. We all saw the insurrection, and heard ‘grab them by the pussy’. That Trump is an ogrish imbecile is beyond doubt. And, I’m sure that to learn that so many people voted for him either in spite of or because of his words and actions must be profoundly unsettling - much like Brexit was for me.
But the vitriol coming from the left-commentariat now is Trump-at-his-worst-grade hatred addressed at everyone who voted Republican - thus implying that everyone who voted Trump stands behind everything he says and does 100% (and is thus deserving of hate-speech-cranked-up-to-11). This seems like an unnecessary escalation of political polarisation. Surely, the best way to defeat your extreme MAGA enemies is to present a front of rational compassion to the quiet majority who hover somewhere in the centre, and who recently veered slightly to the right?
There is no large-scale equivalent to the kind of existential threat that the right paints the left as being. There is no equivalent to the smear that inherently exists in calling somebody (and I mean directly, not by implication) a pedophile.
Something just shy of 2/3rds of the country directs their antipathy toward Donald J. Trump – a single person. His supporters are being taken to task for one thing and one thing only: supporting this horrid human being and authoritarian wannabe’.
Donald Trump, and – by proxy – his ardent followers direct their bile, hatred, and stochastic terrorism at the other 2/3rds of the country, in stereotypical cult fashion.
Though our Courts confer a presumption of innocence, public opinion does not. When you call the other side monsters – Socialists, Communists, and Marxists who are a threat to your kids and your very existence – you have created a harm that basically cannot be undone.
Was Maxine Waters out of line by suggesting a bullying campaign? Of course. Was Joe Biden calling half the country fascists? No. He used the term “semi-fascism” to describe a very specific and very narrow group of people for whom the actual term fits.
“Whataboutism” effectively died in about 2016. We should bury it until the scales level a bit.
I’m very sorry to hear about the concerns you and your wife have, and I assure you that I’m not on any ‘side’. (I’m aware that this sounds sarcastic or condescending, but I really do mean it sincerely)
But I don’t think that everyone who voted for Trump did so specifically and personally out of spite for you. What will vitriolically hating 50% of those around you get you, exactly? How will this make things better? You’re ‘punching back’ against people who - for the most part - have no idea how or that they wronged you in the first place.
I’m sure we could dig up a few extreme examples of hateful MAGA bigots who really do rejoice in your and your wife’s suffering in particular regard to the medical procedures you mention. But do you really think that half of your country is consciously and malevolently out to get you?
Have no fear, I do not believe you’re being sacrastic or condescending.
There is a tendancy for us not to want to hold large groups of people responsible for what they’ve done. This is understandable because most of us just don’t think collective punishment is a good idea. For many years, it was fairly common for people to look at the actions of the Nazi government and excuse the average German. They weren’t a party to the atrocities. They were kept in the dark. Poppycock! The Nazis were able to commit those atrocities because most Germans were either fine with it or had a callous disregard for the victims. “First they came for the Communist…” and all that. It’s the same with anyone who supported Trump.
What will vitriolically hating those around me get me? Well, I don’t vitriolically hate them, mostly I’m just very, very disappointed, but what the hell did treating them with compassion and respect get me? Fuck all as far as I can tell. I’ve tried engaging these people, treating them with empathy, and tried to see things from their perspective. I’m not going to go out of my way to insult them, but like I said, if I hear them complain about Trump’s policies hurting them I’m going to shrug and ask them what they expected. This is what they wanted. They get no sympathy from me.
I think half of them are indifferent. If you think that’s of any comfort to me you’d be wrong. In truth I do understand that I have little choice but to live with these people. They are simply too numerous to ignore.
We centrists have heard this at school or maybe work and did not like it. (Note I did not say you were wrong factually.) That’s why Harris instead repeatedly said that we have more in common than what separates us.
I’ve posted before questioning whether campaigning works. But I’m seeing surprising-to-me evidence that Harris’s campaigning worked (albeit not enough to overcome the anti-incumbent-party mood):
Semafor: Democratic turnout plummeted in 2024 — but only in safe states
Puleez, really? He looks good in comparison?
In all due respect of course.
In my opinion the centrist/liberal refusal to call the Right out on its stupidity and evil has encouraged them, incentivized them (since the worse they got the more immune to criticism they became), and looked to a lot of people like an implicit confession that the Right was the correct side. After all if the Right were the bad guys, then why was was everyone else so unwilling to say what they were doing wrong?
The centrists and liberals acted like the Right were at worst reasonable people who disagreed with them, and quite likely actually the good guys, and that’s the way they pushed people to regard the Right as. With the results we’ve seen.
That’s a bridge too far.
The vitriol you’re hearing from the left right now, which is largely coming from a place of genuine fear in the immediate aftermath of a crushing electoral defeat, is roughly on par to the vitriol that’s been mainstream conservative opinion for at least a decade now. The idea that not voting Republican - hell, that not voting for Trump specifically - makes you a traitor to the country is not a fringe position on the right. It’s something actively promulgated by the conservative political leadership. The elected officials and officers of the Republican Party have almost entirely been replaced by Trump sycophants who eagerly echo his worst excesses.
Does that mean that every single person who voted for Trump shares his exact prejudices? No, of course not. But it does mean that every one of them didn’t care about them. They knew exactly what he was, and they were okay with giving him the Oval Office. You want to argue that there’s a moral difference between that, and enthusiastically agreeing with Trump, go ahead, but you are splitting the finest of hairs.
It isn’t. Trump was a weak candidate with low favorability numbers. Unfortunately, a great many voters framed the election as a referendum on the incumbent presidential party, rather than, as I did, a choice regarding who would be the steadiest hand on the nuclear trigger.
And there I go framing it as “Gee, which one has two impeachments, one conviction, a rape, spent his life lying and conning people, and said he would put his political opponents in jail…or worse?”
In general, not talking about Trump, it will always be the case that you have lots of internet posters, and even TV commentators, who take positions that are more hateful than that of any politician. The comparison, in terms of who is more hateful, should be between Trump and Jeffries, or between the progressives on this thread and the conservatives at someplace like FreeRepublic.com.
I’m against treating Trump voters in a guilt by association manner. But I do not see how Trump looks good in comparison to any important figure in U.S. politics.
They are not “associating” they are voting.
Maybe Trump looks better than other habitual lying rapists in comparison.
Got someone particular in mind @phillyGuy?
I do not understand the point of the post above. But my answer to the question is no.
Good point - really - although the thrust of my argument is still about the optics beaming out from leftists/progressives/democrats right now in grassroots forums such as this one - as well as in mainstream left-leaning media. “Half of the country is evil, is our enemy, is out to get us, and we therefore must be pre-emptively out to get them!!”.
Just, no: this is a bonkers starting position for any line of political discourse, and especially one from a wounded and badly discredited political party already on the back foot.
There are no mainstream left leaning media, by definition. More to the point almost nobody outside the Left pays attention to what the Left actually says, they pay attention to what the Right says about the Left. Optics don’t matter, nobody is looking.
This is so depressingly accurate.