There's also the #wheresJoe conspiracy that was born from the "Biden's team is hiding him so the world won't see his dementia." It's a dog-whistle though, so plausible deniability probably means it won't be moderated as harshly as it should.
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Democratic Presidential Primaries & Caucuses |March OT| Last Tuesday was 1000 years ago, old news no one cares about (Discussion Guidelines in OP)
- Thread starter Poodlestrike
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No one is having an honest conversation though. Its "he's got dementia/is senile/is sun setting" bullshit.
He's damn near 80 so sure, he's not as high energy as he used to be but the same can easily be said for Bernie Sanders.
If we're all about a candidate with the sharpest whit and most present intellect then whats the argument for progressives not rallying behind Elizabeth Warren? In polling during the middle of the primary she was seen as objectively the most intelligent by the majority of the Dem party.
Instead we get shit like the first Bloomberg debate where Sanders supporters are talking about how "Bernie and Warren shut down Bloomberg's campaign!" when Sanders didn't do shit but run his stump on loop.
To that end, another sign of declining mental faculty is intransigence and repetative dialogue. Sure makes you wonder why Sanders answers every question with a line out of his stump speech.
See how easy it is to concern troll this shit?
If you want an honest conversation then have one, don't act like your ancient candidate is an immortal god while the other guy got wheeled out of a retirement home.
Sanders is explicitly not a "real Dem" by his own volition though. He's registered as an Independent now. The DNC set the primary rules up to let him run and stay an independent. Just like how they've let him run in Dem primaries for his senate seat, win, then renounce the nom to be listed as an Independent on the GE ballot.
You can vote for who you want in the GE. What people keep trying to explain to the intransigent Sanders supporter is that our political system is a first past the post format which inherently forces a two party structure. There is no coalition building between 2nd and 3rd to surpass a non-majority first place finisher. Ignoring that is myopic.
Second, a large part of our society, including a large contingent of Sanders supporters, act like voting is some kind of sacred personal act of fidelity (hence the stupid "bend the knee" bullshit). This isn't a feudalist regime where you swear fealty. Its a democratic system via representative republic. Your vote is simultaneously a right and an obligation. People have fought and died for the right to vote in this country. We've put laws in place to protect that right. The moral philosophy inherent with a democratic system obligates one to exercise the vote in order to produce the best representative for the body as a whole.
I personally don't get why the moderate Dems keep trying to court Sanders supporters. My general feeling is you either show up and vote to get Trump out or you can fuck right the fuck off. This isn't a hard choice. Biden was way down my primary candidate list but I'll still campaign, donate, and vote for the guy because the gap between Biden and Trump is orders of magnitude larger than the gap between Biden and my ideal. That should be obvious to anyone who doesn't want an authoritarian though.
Which is the real problem with the moderate Dems trying to cajole Sanders supporters into voting Biden. Moderate dems see Sanders' self-appointed "Democratic Socialist" label and see the second word as a problem in the GE. Sanders' most devout online supporters see Sanders' biggest weakness as the first word in that label. They want socialism, they want it now, and the fact that the nation at large does not means that the "establishment" stole it from them, has no morality, etc. etc.. All the gas lighting progressives have been using on moderates this entire time and continue to use, including on this very forum.
So maybe both sides should stop gas lighting each other and the Sanders supporters who think they gave their promise ring to Bernie can save their electoral V card for the next progressive who tells them what they want to hear but sucks at actual politics. That kind of person has never been relevant to realizing any actual progress in this country and they never will be.
If this was the case then how would the same not apply to Sanders?
In this hypothetical cling to Trump out of fear and a need for security how do you think a "revolution" with Sanders plays better than a 30 year senator, 8 year VP that everyone knows?
The steady hand for trying times candidate is clearly Biden. We see that in how the moderate Dems across the nation coalesced around him on Super Tuesday. We see that in how his polling numbers are only improving against Trump over the last month or so.
Your argument is inherently pro-Biden, yet you're trying to frame it as just the opposite.
You are discounting:
1. The level of hate Fox News has already sown regarding AOC.
2. The level of hate a lot of even Dem voters (both progressive and moderate) will have simply for her being a woman.
3. The continuation of anti-brown people rhetoric the GOP will continue with for at least the next decade, weaponizing her ethnicity as a way to depict her as "foreign" when her family's immigration to this country is analogous with the generations the Trumps have been in the U.S..
There will be a lot of excitement if AOC ever ran for POTUS and it won't be in her favor. She's the right's new Hillary Clinton. She seems like a far better person morally and far more capable of actually talking to people instead of being a pure technocrat like Clinton, but right wing media has the playbook in hand and started it on AOC day one.
She would make far more of a difference staying in congress as a progressive magnet pulling the party leftward in times of Dem power. Her path to true political power would be to continue that work and, in 10-20 years when the party has shifted substantially left, have a legitimate shot at Speaker.
Though at this point the likely successor to Pelosi in the near term is Adam Schiff. He put himself massively on the map with Trump's impeachment trial. I'd be very up for seeing Biden select him as AG though, as that would give strong suggestion that his administration would prosecute the crimes of the Trump admin.
Biden most represents the will of the voters. He was the favorite going into this, declined in the early states, and yet had strong enough core support to blow past everyone when it mattered. He has always been the strongest in head to head polling against Trump both nationwide and in every swing state.
He is easily the best choice to beat Trump, regardless of any TV diagnosed health concerns. If he was to hand off the nomination up to or at the convention we'd be handing the general election to Trump with a bow on it.
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Except there is actual policy content in there relevant to the average citizen, and it is worth repeating. That's a weak burn. I mean I would argue you could apply repitition to any of the candidates tough. Buttigieg was repeating his middle of the road schtick ad nauseum. Warren 'I have a plan', Biden 'reach across the aisle',
This kind of attitude raises a big concern, because is the issue here ableism, ageism and gross misuse of medical conditions, or is there simply just being a shield raised around the now leading candidate and anyone who has an issue with him and want to point it out is getting branded as being some botfarm.
People are taking note of his slurred speech and his behaviour, on live television, which is quite frankly extremely worrying.
People were spewing this garbage and then saying "just wait until the debate! You'll see!" And then the debate happened. And we didn't see. Biden has a lot of garbage that you can attack him on. Attack him on the issues. Don't try to make it seem like he's mentally incapacitated. What the hell is the point? Are they trying to make Sanders the "Not Biden" candidate?
good mod update, thanks
first and foremost it curbs the nastiness of the dementia talk which is just gross. as someone who has had family suffer from dementia all that talk made this thread very uncomfortable to read.
it also shifts the discussion around biden to more suitable grounds where we can actually have a good faith discussion about the tangible things that seem to be an issue for him as a candidate especially in light of this virus and his handling of it so far. these are dire times and it's important to be honest about those who could potentially be leading us though these kinds of crises. having bad faith posts essentially weaponize the nastiness of the dementia claim as a way to quickly pivot away from legitimate concerns was also very uncomfortable to read.
hopefully this thread can be less of a tire fire going forward because of this so thanks again. as someone who has posted far less in this thread as of recent this update is noticed and appreciated
be safe yall
first and foremost it curbs the nastiness of the dementia talk which is just gross. as someone who has had family suffer from dementia all that talk made this thread very uncomfortable to read.
it also shifts the discussion around biden to more suitable grounds where we can actually have a good faith discussion about the tangible things that seem to be an issue for him as a candidate especially in light of this virus and his handling of it so far. these are dire times and it's important to be honest about those who could potentially be leading us though these kinds of crises. having bad faith posts essentially weaponize the nastiness of the dementia claim as a way to quickly pivot away from legitimate concerns was also very uncomfortable to read.
hopefully this thread can be less of a tire fire going forward because of this so thanks again. as someone who has posted far less in this thread as of recent this update is noticed and appreciated
be safe yall
It only makes sense to bring this stuff up if you legitimately think another candidate will be nominated to run for president. If you don't the only thing you are accomplishing is making the case for Trump stronger.
Believe it or not, some people aren't just airing these observations out because they're still trying to trip him from getting nominated. It's a valid observation people can and will talk about. "He's the nominee now, you can't talk bad about him or you're helping the bad guys" and gaslighting everyone who wants to talk about it in to oblivion because he's the champion now is, quite frankly, a clusterfuck of an attitude to have towards people on the same side as you.
He sounds like a normal rambly older person, do you honestly believe that whenever he speaks he's slurring his speech?
The evidence for this stuff is often so weak. Biden can have like an hour of video of him speaking and then someone will clip a 15 second portion of him misspeaking, post it on Twitter, and say that he has dementia. I dunno about this.
If we're going to criticise Biden can we do it on the basis of his many real problems.
Have you actually listed your concerns about how Biden has failed during this crisis?
Biden is likely going to be the nominee. If we actually are on the same side you'd be looking for the positives that Biden brings rather than exclusively focusing on the negatives. Again what exactly are you accomplishing by discussing Biden's age/vigor? It sure as hell isn't doing anything to help get Republicans out of power.
It only makes sense to discuss these things if you still believe someone else can be nominated. Otherwise you are hurting the cause. That is not gaslighting, it's the fucking truth.
User Banned (permanent): troll account
why do you have a hardcore marxist/maoist as your avatar if you're this passionate about defending a neoliberal american-imperialist war criminal from fair criticism of his inability to form coherent sentences
and then you have another poster on this page talking about how sacred american capitalist democracy is with an avatar from noted anarcho-communist urusula k le guin
I would point out most of the libs here seem to have no idea what the art they consume means, but this is a video game message board so
Who's gaslighting? Watch the debate. I'm not stopping anyone from watching all of Biden. It's funny how you talk about gaslighting but the "Biden has mental issues" camp only wants to post small clips (many of which have been edited) where they can create their own narrative. After watching the entire 1v1 debate, you want to say he has mental health issues? Even the narrative out of most of Sanders supporters was that he lied the entire time, not that he was stumbling over his words or not completing sentences.
No, it doesn't matter if he has competition for the nomination or not anymore. Telling someone airing out their grievances, that this is what dems are sending to fight Trump, that they should shut up or trying to paint them as morally in the wrong and an enemy, is extreme gaslighting.
It's gaslighting to tell people that they are just seeing things because they don't like him, or that the footage is doctored. I mean, sure he's not unhinged all of the time, and he can talk coherently for majority of speeches, but those "small" moments that gets clipped sure keep adding up to a worrying amount. And they're real, they aren't deep faked or CGI'd. Compiling them all one place doesn't somehow make it doctored or means it doesn't happen.
The man has a stutter. The stutter gets harder to control with age. To stop yourself from stuttering you either pause before it happens or replace the word you were about to stutter.
It's gaslighting to say that none of them are doctored lmao. You honestly believe in the 363 pages (100ppp) of this thread you can't find any edited footage to try to push the Biden = mental incapacitation (of whatever variety) narrative? And I'm not talking about "Biden's greatest hits" from one speech either.
Only post good things about this candidate who is a horrible person or you're actually just helping the nazis
Okay, you think Biden isn't mentally up for the job of being president. And you're concerned that he will lose because of this. Once again what positive outcome will exclusively pointing out your concerns about Biden while not saying anything good about him bring about? The only thing I can think of is someone else becoming the nominee or president. But maybe there is something else?
It is not "medically accurate", and is too general a term to even be considered "accurate" when applied to an older person. If an older person wrinkles even slightly, or loses a bit of speed, they would be put under the loose banner of "senile".
It is not a specific concern for Biden nor Sanders either. "Sanders had a heart attack, he needs to go"? Not for that reason, he doesn't. "Biden seems to have lost a step, and just look at him in this short video clip, he needs to go"? Not for that reason, he doesn't.
IMO senility is an outmoded classification of aging and societal treatment of aging. There are realities of aging, yes, but those realities alone do not and should not diminish the dignity of someone as a person - and we should not allow people to be so casually robbed of that dignity.
If you think someone is not dignified enough to be a presidential candidate, there are plenty of representational, policy, and political-record reasons to cite as to why.
Aging, acute medical episodes, and lifelong physiological conditions aren't necessary to cite to establish someone's level of dignity. By doing so, you are just sending a signal that it is okay to diminish ANYONE who is experiencing aging.
THANK YOU.
And seeing people just straight up say that bringing up these concerns means I must support Trump is shitty also! Like, WTF. I'm extremely concerned about this man's ability to BEAT Trump because of these things, ffs.
Not gonna lie, I woke up to a notification about this thread that my recent report has been resolved, with no details whatsoever, and I can only assume that refers to this:
This "okay, so from NOW ON" approach completely lets people off the hook for trivializing and weaponizing a very sensitive and personal issue to many of us, including signal boosting various misleading, if not outright doctored right-wing sources and conspiracy theories, and to what end? That's the culture and level of discourse that's been cultivated here.
Two years ago I lost my grandmother to dementia. I saw that happen in real time over the course of over ten years. Biden stumbling over a few words here and there is not that. People can criticize Biden on his ideas all they want. I have in the past and will continue to do so in the future. However I feel like it speaks a lot about peoples' character what their next move is when they lose the battle of ideas, or whatever you want to call this farce of a primary.
I voted for Bernie Sanders in 2016 partly because I genuinely believed he was an honest politician. I've cooled on him since then but fundamentally I still believe that's true. But the depths some of his followers have stooped to are frankly disgusting, and the worst part is, it won't even amount to anything. Pending some kind of unprecedented change in fortune, Joe Biden is the likeliest person to become the Democratic nominee, and possibly even to win the presidential election. You'll have dropped your pants and proudly showed your ass to the entire world only for it to keep on moving without you.
I'm not putting this out there in the interest of antagonizing anyone. In fact, this will probably be my last post in this thread altogether, as I simply can't deal with the toxicity and negativity contained within it anymore. I still like this community as a whole and I don't wish to leave it, but I've been left feeling very unwelcome to most of it over the last few months. If the staff here is really willing to step up their game, I'd be delighted to see that.
...and it feels like a bit of a slap in the face. No disrespect meant to the mod team here, but the fact that things were even allowed to get to this point should be very concerning. Everyone should have known this was wrong the minute this "Biden has dementia" crap started, I know I'm not the only one who's been beating that drum around here, and it should have been moderated appropriately from day one.
This "okay, so from NOW ON" approach completely lets people off the hook for trivializing and weaponizing a very sensitive and personal issue to many of us, including signal boosting various misleading, if not outright doctored right-wing sources and conspiracy theories, and to what end? That's the culture and level of discourse that's been cultivated here.
Two years ago I lost my grandmother to dementia. I saw that happen in real time over the course of over ten years. Biden stumbling over a few words here and there is not that. People can criticize Biden on his ideas all they want. I have in the past and will continue to do so in the future. However I feel like it speaks a lot about peoples' character what their next move is when they lose the battle of ideas, or whatever you want to call this farce of a primary.
I voted for Bernie Sanders in 2016 partly because I genuinely believed he was an honest politician. I've cooled on him since then but fundamentally I still believe that's true. But the depths some of his followers have stooped to are frankly disgusting, and the worst part is, it won't even amount to anything. Pending some kind of unprecedented change in fortune, Joe Biden is the likeliest person to become the Democratic nominee, and possibly even to win the presidential election. You'll have dropped your pants and proudly showed your ass to the entire world only for it to keep on moving without you.
I'm not putting this out there in the interest of antagonizing anyone. In fact, this will probably be my last post in this thread altogether, as I simply can't deal with the toxicity and negativity contained within it anymore. I still like this community as a whole and I don't wish to leave it, but I've been left feeling very unwelcome to most of it over the last few months. If the staff here is really willing to step up their game, I'd be delighted to see that.
going by your posts in the poliERA thread, you seem to be the mod that advocated for this new moderation policy on the term "dementia". so i will ask you exactly what it means. it's important that it's clear if it's going to be the basis for moderation decisions.
the mod advice talks specifically about moderating the use of the diagnosis "dementia". does this moderation policy apply also to use of the term "senility" or not? if it does, this should be stated
i will also mention, that for months, people were allowed to bring up heart attack concerns without any moderation. changing moderation policy at this point in time to to a blanket ban on bringing up concerns about age when it was ok in the past when another candidate had age-related concerns brought up looks suspect and partisan from the outside. (i'm saying that how it looks, not saying that's how it is)
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Sanders literally had a heart attack. What are you talking about?
With the Intercept thread, "Biden has dementia" wasn't even close to the thing people should have been attacking him on.
We have another Presidential candidate with claims of sexual abuse. The most powerful person in the country is gonna be either that or Donald Trump. Fuck.
We have another Presidential candidate with claims of sexual abuse. The most powerful person in the country is gonna be either that or Donald Trump. Fuck.
I was wondering why my instagram was flooded with "Wheres Joe" memes. When I responded to some saying he was just on CNN people didn't believe me. It's like facts don't matter anymore.
I've been saying this, but people are really hung up on his mental state and not the plethora of other items like his currently lackluster policy list or problematic behavior.
Guaranteed he will be pressed on the sexual harassment allegations in time. The media won't let that slide without comment.
Maybe you should stop trying to fish for agendas when people talk about something you don't want them to talk about.
He was running against two persons in this race who were older than him that never once got referred to as being senile, even when they had unhinged moments. I honestly don't think people are just trying to rob his dignity for being old, and this just reeks of yet another attempt of trying to take a moral high ground to censor people. You know what other active politician got called demetented all the time? Trump, on this very board, for 3 years. A quick google search even shows people active in this thread calling him demented in posts.
It's okay to try and stop the use of dementia as a buzzword because it's a serious medical condition that shouldn't be used for mudslinging, but it's real hecking funny how any implication of his mental decline or senility is being hushed now, or people talking about it shunned away as enemies of progression.
It's probably being talked more and more about as an escalation of people trying to silence any implication of it, and shape narratives. You're right, there's a mountain pile of things wrong with him that should be talked about instead.
You can talk about it all you want (and you clearly are), but that doesn't change the fact that it's counterproductive.
People weren't coming up with theories to say that Bernie had a heart attack, it only became a concern after he was diagnosed. Meanwhile, people are theorizing that Biden has dementia even though he hasn't been diagnosed with anything.
The difference should be pretty clear to anyone who isn't highly partisan.
I had nothing to do with the thread reply banner. It was already there when I came on this morning. But I am not the only moderator who has been troubled by the use of "dementia" in political discussions.
The discussion in here shifted to senility, which the thread banner seems to allow ("presence of mind"), so I weighed in on that from a personal standpoint and from a standpoint of someone's personal dignity - not from a standpoint of censoring people.
I too know nothing about JLG and believe he was a devout Marxist revolutionary from the womb 😂
Except we know for a fact that Bernie had a heart attack. We cannot say the same for Biden's "dementia" without hearsay and rumor mongering from questionable sources.
This isn't metacommentary about this thread, but rather, a note on how internet FUD* is developed. We've seen this going back at least a decade in politics and it's probably older than that: Field testing different attacks and then spreading them around first to the faithful, then to the people who aren't part of the attacking group but who latch onto the idea, and then ultimately to people who buy into them without any connection. Drudge did this, then Breitbart, and Gamergate, and the Russians found entries into these pipelines.
Don't buy into it.
"Where's Biden/Biden has dementia" are so obviously manufactured concerns. You can also see where there were attempts that did stick (turning Biden's handsiness into molestation was an early one), and there were other ones for other candidates when they took the lead ("Warren is a Republican" was all the rage for all of a week). And when Bernie was out in front, every not-negative thing he said about Russia/Cuba 20-30 years ago was put through the internet loudspeaker, too. The heart attack I'm not going to include because it was a literal heart attack and for all that, it didn't really stick.
Anyway, I'd be all for a stricter rule here on concern trolling, especially when it uses techniques like a supercut (which is just another way of cherry picking and disingenuously framing).
* Fear Uncertainty, Doubt, an old marketing tactic to make people shy away from a competitor. Perfected by IBM in their days of market dominance.
Don't buy into it.
"Where's Biden/Biden has dementia" are so obviously manufactured concerns. You can also see where there were attempts that did stick (turning Biden's handsiness into molestation was an early one), and there were other ones for other candidates when they took the lead ("Warren is a Republican" was all the rage for all of a week). And when Bernie was out in front, every not-negative thing he said about Russia/Cuba 20-30 years ago was put through the internet loudspeaker, too. The heart attack I'm not going to include because it was a literal heart attack and for all that, it didn't really stick.
Anyway, I'd be all for a stricter rule here on concern trolling, especially when it uses techniques like a supercut (which is just another way of cherry picking and disingenuously framing).
* Fear Uncertainty, Doubt, an old marketing tactic to make people shy away from a competitor. Perfected by IBM in their days of market dominance.
So, if I post a 15 second video of Sanders screaming incoherently and express "concerns" that "more incidents like this would cast him in a ugly light", would you take that as valid criticism?
Or would you scream at me in return?
Here's the thing. Biden's not my second choice. Hell, he's not even my third or fourth choice. Before the Berners launched hatchet jobs against Warren, I would of leaped into the Sanders wagon myself. But between the pie-in-the-sky plans proposed by the Sanders campaign that are basically Warren's plans scaled up by 50% at best and actively detrimental to America's future at worst and the smug satisfaction of the Berners as they boast that they killed off yet another campaign so that the Dems would have no choice but to nominate someone whose campaign undercut them and whose supporters backstabs them in every moment they can get...
The 'Warren is a snek, Warren is a Republican is disguise' attacks is when finally swore me off of Sanders.
Or would you scream at me in return?
Here's the thing. Biden's not my second choice. Hell, he's not even my third or fourth choice. Before the Berners launched hatchet jobs against Warren, I would of leaped into the Sanders wagon myself. But between the pie-in-the-sky plans proposed by the Sanders campaign that are basically Warren's plans scaled up by 50% at best and actively detrimental to America's future at worst and the smug satisfaction of the Berners as they boast that they killed off yet another campaign so that the Dems would have no choice but to nominate someone whose campaign undercut them and whose supporters backstabs them in every moment they can get...
The 'Warren is a snek, Warren is a Republican is disguise' attacks is when finally swore me off of Sanders.
This feels like more when you're in a job interview, and the interviewer is awkward and robotic as hell, so you second guess everything you say because you can't read the person. Like the content of what he said and how he said it was fine and made sense, but she just stood there looking stupid for some reason.
Looks more like the kind of awkwardness you get on conference calls when there's a slight delay.
I have no idea how this is construed as mental failing unless one is deep in the thrall of confirmation bias.
Are you trying to say calling someone I hate an alt-right centrist neoliberal shill is using the word incorrectly?
..I just want to point out all the ways he's wrong.
Terrible headline.
Stop trying to turn this thread in to a police state, I'm already afraid of posting here because I can feel the mods breathing down my neck. 😭😭😭😭
Especially since if he were Biden, they'd use it as evidence for cognitive decline.
Did you actually read the article?
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