WOW. Before the "Bernie Bro," Clinton supporters created the "Obama boy."

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

Except "Bernie Bro" isn't a creation: It's a real thing. I go to a University - I see this sh**t for real. There's a hotbed of it. Any commentator who dares criticize Bernie sees thousands of pages of Bernie supporters raging against that commentator. Sometimes it's knowledgeable, most of the time it's not.

But oh, I'm just a TRUMP TROLL, so ignore any points I make

Sure, "Berniebros" exist if your definition of them is just someone who defends Bernie Sanders online. How does that make them different from supporters of any other candidate ever though?

I have many, many friends (male and female) who support Sanders but do not throw temper tantrums everytime someone disagrees with them or he loses by 0.2%. I have had a good number of vigorous and substantive debates about our support for differing candidates and at the end we simply agreed to disagree and not let things come in between us.

There were high emotions in 2012 and 2014, but that was in the run-up to the election, usually breaking the surface in September and blowing up in October (especially after the 2012 debates) and on election night, but not like this during the primaries. I vaguely remember the 2008 election but there was little arguing because we were all 13 and just parroted out parents' views (like good 13 year olds).

2016 has been a whole new level. The vast majority of both Hillary and Bernie supporters (and the small number of GOPers as well) are deeply invested in this, but the Bernie Bros are a real thing and they really are aggressive and intimidating.

[Shadows]

Anyways, Berniebros are a vocal minority. Try to prove me wrong if you want.

Probably 1-2%? I don't know, Hillary hacks are huge in number & morally bankrupt. The things they support are unbelievable. Anyone who makes sexist remarks should be condemned but the interesting fact is Hillary did the same with Obama - "Obama boys".

Is it a pattern? Does she want to play the victim card? Helpless attacked woman card?

[Famous Mortimer]

Except "Bernie Bro" isn't a creation: It's a real thing. I go to a University - I see this sh**t for real. There's a hotbed of it. Any commentator who dares criticize Bernie sees thousands of pages of Bernie supporters raging against that commentator. Sometimes it's knowledgeable, most of the time it's not.

But oh, I'm just a TRUMP TROLL, so ignore any points I make

Sure, "Berniebros" exist if your definition of them is just someone who defends Bernie Sanders online. How does that make them different from supporters of any other candidate ever though?

I have many, many friends (male and female) who support Sanders but do not throw temper tantrums everytime someone disagrees with them or he loses by 0.2%. I have had a good number of vigorous and substantive debates about our support for differing candidates and at the end we simply agreed to disagree and not let things come in between us.

There were high emotions in 2012 and 2014, but that was in the run-up to the election, usually breaking the surface in September and blowing up in October (especially after the 2012 debates) and on election night, but not like this during the primaries. I vaguely remember the 2008 election but there was little arguing because we were all 13 and just parroted out parents' views (like good 13 year olds).

2016 has been a whole new level. The vast majority of both Hillary and Bernie supporters (and the small number of GOPers as well) are deeply invested in this, but the Bernie Bros are a real thing and they really are aggressive and intimidating.

So you admit this is the first election you've had the critical faculty to follow but then you insist it's "a whole new level". Which is it? Sorry, bub. Every election is like this. 2008 was like this. 2004 was like this. Every election ever.

[Marokai Backbeat]

"Some of this candidate's core supporters are fanatical and crazy!" is among the lowest forms of political analysis. You could apply it to any candidate that has a significant following in the history of ever. Mortimer is right - it's absurd people still do this. 2008 was definitely like this, with multiple candidates.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

Except "Bernie Bro" isn't a creation: It's a real thing. I go to a University - I see this sh**t for real. There's a hotbed of it. Any commentator who dares criticize Bernie sees thousands of pages of Bernie supporters raging against that commentator. Sometimes it's knowledgeable, most of the time it's not.

But oh, I'm just a TRUMP TROLL, so ignore any points I make

Sure, "Berniebros" exist if your definition of them is just someone who defends Bernie Sanders online. How does that make them different from supporters of any other candidate ever though?

I have many, many friends (male and female) who support Sanders but do not throw temper tantrums everytime someone disagrees with them or he loses by 0.2%. I have had a good number of vigorous and substantive debates about our support for differing candidates and at the end we simply agreed to disagree and not let things come in between us.

There were high emotions in 2012 and 2014, but that was in the run-up to the election, usually breaking the surface in September and blowing up in October (especially after the 2012 debates) and on election night, but not like this during the primaries. I vaguely remember the 2008 election but there was little arguing because we were all 13 and just parroted out parents' views (like good 13 year olds).

2016 has been a whole new level. The vast majority of both Hillary and Bernie supporters (and the small number of GOPers as well) are deeply invested in this, but the Bernie Bros are a real thing and they really are aggressive and intimidating.

So you admit this is the first election you've had the critical faculty to follow but then you insist it's "a whole new level". Which is it? Sorry, bub. Every election is like this. 2008 was like this. 2004 was like this. Every election ever.

Read my post again. I specifically mentioned an election between 2008 and 2016, when I did not experience the knee-jerk reactions outside of this forum as early as the primaries. I followed 2012 and 2014 very closely and it never spilled over into my personal life the way this one has.

[Ebsy]

2008 was definitely nastier than this of the Democratic side. We've yet to have a "Likable enough" moment.

[ProgressiveCanadian]

Same tactics as 2008. Why not talk about the issues instead of these attacks.

[Lyin' Steve]

Yeah this is nothing like 2008.  Obama blasted Clinton as a warmongering old shrew with a bumbling racist buffoon of a husband.  He enlisted black leaders to call everything Clinton did racist and manufactured fake race controversies to control the media.  Clinton threw the kitchen table at Obama with underhanded attacks like the muslim rumors, claiming he had been taught wahhabi Islam in an Indonesian madrassa, Reverend Wright, Bill Ayers, Tony Rezko, the 3 AM phone call, does anyone remember this stuff?  She also fought tooth and nail to get the Florida delegates seated at the convention after she'd won them when before the results came in she was perfectly in agreement that they could go to hell.

By the way, none of these Clinton attacks really lit up until March.  If this race with Sanders actually gets close, the old brawler is going to come out.

[Shadows]

Glenn Greenwald on Jan 31st - The "Bernie Bros" Narrative is a cheap campaign tactic

Just as neocons have long sought to exploit “anti-Semitism” accusations as a means of deterring and delegitimizing criticisms of Israel (thus weakening and trivializing the ability to combat that very real menace), Clinton media supporters are cynically exploiting serious and disturbing phenomena and weaponizing them as tools for the Clinton campaign. Online abuse in general, and toward specific groups, is a very real and serious problem; it is not a tool to be used to advance the political empowerment of Hillary Clinton by smearing Sanders supporters as particularly guilty of it.

The concoction of the “Bernie Bro” narrative by pro-Clinton journalists has been a potent political tactic — and a journalistic disgrace. It’s intended to imply two equally false claims: (1) a refusal to march enthusiastically behind the Wall Street-enriched, multiple-war-advocating, despot-embracing Hillary Clinton is explainable not by ideology or political conviction, but largely if not exclusively by sexism: demonstrated by the fact that men, not women, support Sanders (his supporters are “bros”); and (2) Sanders supporters are uniquely abusive and misogynistic in their online behavior. Needless to say, a crucial tactical prong of this innuendo is that any attempt to refute it is itself proof of insensitivity to sexism if not sexism itself (as the accusatory reactions to this article will instantly illustrate).

To put it simply: if you really think that Sanders supporters are particularly abusive online, that says a great deal about which candidate you want to win, and nothing about Sanders supporters. If you spend your time praising Clinton and/or criticizing Sanders, of course you personally will experience more anger and vitriol from Sanders supporters than Clinton supporters.

Conversely, if you spend your time praising Sanders, you will experience far more anger and vitriol from Clinton supporters. If you spend your time criticizing Trump, you’ll think no faction is more abusive than Trump supporters. If you’re an Obama critic, you’ll conclude that his army of devoted worshippers is uniquely toxic. And if you opine that the original Star Trek series is overrated, you’ll be able to write a column about the supreme dark side of nerds, armed with numerous horrifying examples.

https://theintercept.com/2016/01/31/the-bernie-bros-narrative-a-cheap-false-campaign-tactic-masquerading-as-journalism-and-social-activism/

[DS0816]

"Some of this candidate's core supporters are fanatical and crazy!" is among the lowest forms of political analysis. You could apply it to any candidate that has a significant following in the history of ever. Mortimer is right - it's absurd people still do this. 2008 was definitely like this, with multiple candidates.

Not as much as those in the Hillary Clinton camp.

[Oakvale]

Glenn Greenwald on Jan 31st - The "Bernie Bros" Narrative is a cheap campaign tactic

Just as neocons have long sought to exploit “anti-Semitism” accusations as a means of deterring and delegitimizing criticisms of Israel (thus weakening and trivializing the ability to combat that very real menace), Clinton media supporters are cynically exploiting serious and disturbing phenomena and weaponizing them as tools for the Clinton campaign. Online abuse in general, and toward specific groups, is a very real and serious problem; it is not a tool to be used to advance the political empowerment of Hillary Clinton by smearing Sanders supporters as particularly guilty of it.

The concoction of the “Bernie Bro” narrative by pro-Clinton journalists has been a potent political tactic — and a journalistic disgrace. It’s intended to imply two equally false claims: (1) a refusal to march enthusiastically behind the Wall Street-enriched, multiple-war-advocating, despot-embracing Hillary Clinton is explainable not by ideology or political conviction, but largely if not exclusively by sexism: demonstrated by the fact that men, not women, support Sanders (his supporters are “bros”); and (2) Sanders supporters are uniquely abusive and misogynistic in their online behavior. Needless to say, a crucial tactical prong of this innuendo is that any attempt to refute it is itself proof of insensitivity to sexism if not sexism itself (as the accusatory reactions to this article will instantly illustrate).

To put it simply: if you really think that Sanders supporters are particularly abusive online, that says a great deal about which candidate you want to win, and nothing about Sanders supporters. If you spend your time praising Clinton and/or criticizing Sanders, of course you personally will experience more anger and vitriol from Sanders supporters than Clinton supporters.

Conversely, if you spend your time praising Sanders, you will experience far more anger and vitriol from Clinton supporters. If you spend your time criticizing Trump, you’ll think no faction is more abusive than Trump supporters. If you’re an Obama critic, you’ll conclude that his army of devoted worshippers is uniquely toxic. And if you opine that the original Star Trek series is overrated, you’ll be able to write a column about the supreme dark side of nerds, armed with numerous horrifying examples.

https://theintercept.com/2016/01/31/the-bernie-bros-narrative-a-cheap-false-campaign-tactic-masquerading-as-journalism-and-social-activism/

Thanks, but I won't be reading anything by soon-to-be-droned Glenn Greenwald.

[Shadows]

Rachel Maddow interviews Hillary - I get attacks from both Sanders & Clinton camp 50/50. I see no difference, why don't you call your supporters out? Will you give the transcripts?

https://theintercept.com/2016/01/31/the-bernie-bros-narrative-a-cheap-false-campaign-tactic-masquerading-as-journalism-and-social-activism/