Should anything be done about this?

[Wazza [INACTIVE]]

No, though 2 and 3 are hackish and annoying, people should have the right to set their avatars and names to whatever they want.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

If my username "offends" people, I'll change it, fine. In the thread the OP posted, I gave my opinion in a pretty reasonable way, even if some disagreed with it. I've pretty much always responded to serious threads seriously. When my post does seem to use "strawmen," however, I'm citing actual arguments people have made, so perhaps people could get annoyed by the arguments themselves as well. I haven't even posted all that much in that particular board lately, since finishing the primary prediction threads (big time spam, I know.)

Either way, the presidential board has always been terrible. I can guarantee you that if the four of us were banned from the board, the quality wouldn't improve at all. If the quality were higher to begin with, maybe more posters would take it seriously, but come on. We're election nerds talking about a primary that is 8 months away and an election that is almost a year and a half away. Even seemingly good analysis based in data often ages very poorly and very quickly.

Honestly ignoring the questions as to why people don't like names like this, it's pretty silly fundamentally, why exactly do you need to advertise how likely you think a state is to flip in your USERNAME in EVERY SINGLE POST? I could also note how they make the forum slighly more difficult to read and threads a bit more difficult to follow, but I think I touched on the core issue above.

Now as far as the strawmanning goes, look at any thread where "populism" is mentioned, a word that has practically been stripped of all meaning here (not that its meaning was ever clear to begin with granted.) I have never once seen a single poster argue that if the Democrats adopted a platform along the ways of any definition of the word "populist" that they would start winning over longtime hardcore socially conservative Republicans, be able to win Steve King's district, or any other such examples which get bandied about to mock the notion. I've never even seen someone argue that the Democrats would be capable of winning all Obama counties again. The argument is simply that if the Democrats didn't get blown as bad as Hillary Clinton did in such areas, they would be able to win enough states to lock down the EC. This is basically what happened in many races in 2018, the fundamentals of the coalitions didn't change much, but it's really not too much to ask that any 2020 Democratic candidate be able to replicate the numbers of Tony Evers or Gretchen Whitmer. On the flip side I have never once seen anyone unironically say something like "The future of the Democratic Party is in the country clubs of Phoenix and Dallas" or say the best strategy would be for the Democrats to sell unions out completely to pander to millionaires in the Sun Belt. So if people would quit acting like there's a dichotomy of trying to win over Steve King's voters vs. making the Democratic Party a vehicle for country clubbers in sprawling suburbia that would go a long ways.

Another frequent strawmanning I see from the "clique" heatcharger mentioned is the notion that if anyone makes a comment that they believe a Senator or state or whatever is favored to win/lose or remain/flip that means that person and by extension the majority of the forum believes that's an absolute certainty, thus also leading to that pretty irritating "B-b-but..." meme if a single poll comes out that runs contrary to the narrative of any person who ever disagreed with them. Most of the time there isn't even a clear consensus on the topic at hand throughout the forum, yet many think any poll that comes out helping their prediction is proof they're an electoral genius standing against the tide.

Just a few examples. And yes, the presidential election forums have never been great, but these issues are way more pronounced and prominent than they have been in the past.

[Xing]

If my username "offends" people, I'll change it, fine. In the thread the OP posted, I gave my opinion in a pretty reasonable way, even if some disagreed with it. I've pretty much always responded to serious threads seriously. When my post does seem to use "strawmen," however, I'm citing actual arguments people have made, so perhaps people could get annoyed by the arguments themselves as well. I haven't even posted all that much in that particular board lately, since finishing the primary prediction threads (big time spam, I know.)

Either way, the presidential board has always been terrible. I can guarantee you that if the four of us were banned from the board, the quality wouldn't improve at all. If the quality were higher to begin with, maybe more posters would take it seriously, but come on. We're election nerds talking about a primary that is 8 months away and an election that is almost a year and a half away. Even seemingly good analysis based in data often ages very poorly and very quickly.

Honestly ignoring the questions as to why people don't like names like this, it's pretty silly fundamentally, why exactly do you need to advertise how likely you think a state is to flip in your USERNAME in EVERY SINGLE POST? I could also note how they make the forum slighly more difficult to read and threads a bit more difficult to follow, but I think I touched on the core issue above.

Now as far as the strawmanning goes, look at any thread where "populism" is mentioned, a word that has practically been stripped of all meaning here (not that its meaning was ever clear to begin with granted.) I have never once seen a single poster argue that if the Democrats adopted a platform along the ways of any definition of the word "populist" that they would start winning over longtime hardcore socially conservative Republicans, be able to win Steve King's district, or any other such examples which get bandied about to mock the notion. I've never even seen someone argue that the Democrats would be capable of winning all Obama counties again. The argument is simply that if the Democrats didn't get blown as bad as Hillary Clinton did in such areas, they would be able to win enough states to lock down the EC. This is basically what happened in many races in 2018, the fundamentals of the coalitions didn't change much, but it's really not too much to ask that any 2020 Democratic candidate be able to replicate the numbers of Tony Evers or Gretchen Whitmer. On the flip side I have never once seen anyone unironically say something like "The future of the Democratic Party is in the country clubs of Phoenix and Dallas" or say the best strategy would be for the Democrats to sell unions out completely to pander to millionaires in the Sun Belt. So if people would quit acting like there's a dichotomy of trying to win over Steve King's voters vs. making the Democratic Party a vehicle for country clubbers in sprawling suburbia that would go a long ways.

Another frequent strawmanning I see from the "clique" heatcharger mentioned is the notion that if anyone makes a comment that they believe a Senator or state or whatever is favored to win/lose or remain/flip that means that person and by extension the majority of the forum believes that's an absolute certainty, thus also leading to that pretty irritating "B-b-but..." meme if a single poll comes out that runs contrary to the narrative of any person who ever disagreed with them. Most of the time there isn't even a clear consensus on the topic at hand throughout the forum, yet many think any poll that comes out helping their prediction is proof they're an electoral genius standing against the tide.

Just a few examples. And yes, the presidential election forums have never been great, but these issues are way more pronounced and prominent than they have been in the past.

The only time most of any of us have used the word "populist" is to comment on the fact that it seems to have no real meaning anymore, other than a generic positive adjective for candidates people personally like. And I really haven't even done that much at all lately, either. The only example of the other "strawman" you mentioned that I can think of in my case is Biden, but there are people who literally do think he'll win 49 or 50 states, so I'm really not misrepresenting their argument, and just as they have every right to make it, I have every right to say why I disagree and think that it's premature to jump to such conclusions.

I'm all for a higher quality presidential board, but I also think people can lighten up a little bit. The occasional meme isn't going to kill anyone, even if they personally find it annoying and not funny.

[RINO Tom]

Honestly, I don't give a shlt what is done about this "problem," but I will say that I joined this site precisely because of how few hacks were here and how reasonable both political partisans were toward each other.  This site stood apart as a place for politically knowledgeable people to meet up and dig a bit deeper, and there was relatively little arguing about actual issues; it was more of a knowledge base rather than a debate forum.  Go back and look at posts from 2012 and especially before, and people like Krazen or StatesRights and the like are the EXCEPTION, not the norm - and because of this they actually provided a bit of comedic relief, haha.  

Having a million barely distinguishable posters literally arguing about something like "NV D+6 or NV D+3?!?!?!" is pretty lame, and it has dulled the political IQ of this site immensely.  We pretty much have walking, typing Excel spreadsheets that input different data and argue about the end results with no nuance or interesting analysis ... this, along with the election of Trump, has pretty much made any actual elections-based subforum unreadable trash.

[morgankingsley]

Honestly, I don't give a shlt what is done about this "problem," but I will say that I joined this site precisely because of how few hacks were here and how reasonable both political partisans were toward each other.  This site stood apart as a place for politically knowledgeable people to meet up and dig a bit deeper, and there was relatively little arguing about actual issues; it was more of a knowledge base rather than a debate forum.  Go back and look at posts from 2012 and especially before, and people like Krazen or StatesRights and the like are the EXCEPTION, not the norm - and because of this they actually provided a bit of comedic relief, haha.  

Having a million barely distinguishable posters literally arguing about something like "NV D+6 or NV D+3?!?!?!" is pretty lame, and it has dulled the political IQ of this site immensely.  We pretty much have walking, typing Excel spreadsheets that input different data and argue about the end results with no nuance or interesting analysis ... this, along with the election of Trump, has pretty much made any actual elections-based subforum unreadable trash.

At least the community board is still fun

[OSR stands with Israel]

What I find sad is that a thread like this got only 1 reply: https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=321472.0


but I made a thread about some hypothetical matchup that has a very little chance of taking place would be filled with replys

[Foucaulf]

Having a million barely distinguishable posters literally arguing about something like "NV D+6 or NV D+3?!?!?!" is pretty lame, and it has dulled the political IQ of this site immensely.  We pretty much have walking, typing Excel spreadsheets that input different data and argue about the end results with no nuance or interesting analysis ... this, along with the election of Trump, has pretty much made any actual elections-based subforum unreadable trash.

This ties into a theory I proposed on AAD a while ago so I'll bring it up again:

- The forum in the past operated on an apprenticeship system. Arguing about politics is fun; doing electoral analysis isn't. When past national elections would bring in a wave of young or curious posters, veteran posters would be generous with their time and inform these new posters about trends or electoral analysis methods. The regulars who stuck around are the ones who put hours into reading up about elections and adapted to the culture the most.

- This system broke during 2015 with an exodus of veteran posters to AAD. Then Trump happened. The wave of 2016 posters didn't have any veterans guiding them on how to cut through noise in the news and think about electoral analysis, because most of them left. That wave of posters wasn't exposed to the forum's old culture, but a never-ending torrent of drama and trolls.

- Trump got elected and trolls left, but the veteran posters didn't come back. The role of the veteran poster was instead replaced by social media - linking tweets or cable news. While there's some signal in social media, there's also a lot of noise.

- Now, even if veteran posters want to join the Atlas discussion, too many new posters only know how to parrot what they see elsewhere on the internet. The forum assimilated to a wider political culture.

[Goldwater]

Avatar Absolutism™ would be ideal ... stick with your username, have the avatar of your actual preferred party and state you identify with.

Sorry, I refuse to go by "Republitarian".

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

If my username "offends" people, I'll change it, fine. In the thread the OP posted, I gave my opinion in a pretty reasonable way, even if some disagreed with it. I've pretty much always responded to serious threads seriously. When my post does seem to use "strawmen," however, I'm citing actual arguments people have made, so perhaps people could get annoyed by the arguments themselves as well. I haven't even posted all that much in that particular board lately, since finishing the primary prediction threads (big time spam, I know.)

Either way, the presidential board has always been terrible. I can guarantee you that if the four of us were banned from the board, the quality wouldn't improve at all. If the quality were higher to begin with, maybe more posters would take it seriously, but come on. We're election nerds talking about a primary that is 8 months away and an election that is almost a year and a half away. Even seemingly good analysis based in data often ages very poorly and very quickly.

Honestly ignoring the questions as to why people don't like names like this, it's pretty silly fundamentally, why exactly do you need to advertise how likely you think a state is to flip in your USERNAME in EVERY SINGLE POST? I could also note how they make the forum slighly more difficult to read and threads a bit more difficult to follow, but I think I touched on the core issue above.

Now as far as the strawmanning goes, look at any thread where "populism" is mentioned, a word that has practically been stripped of all meaning here (not that its meaning was ever clear to begin with granted.) I have never once seen a single poster argue that if the Democrats adopted a platform along the ways of any definition of the word "populist" that they would start winning over longtime hardcore socially conservative Republicans, be able to win Steve King's district, or any other such examples which get bandied about to mock the notion. I've never even seen someone argue that the Democrats would be capable of winning all Obama counties again. The argument is simply that if the Democrats didn't get blown as bad as Hillary Clinton did in such areas, they would be able to win enough states to lock down the EC. This is basically what happened in many races in 2018, the fundamentals of the coalitions didn't change much, but it's really not too much to ask that any 2020 Democratic candidate be able to replicate the numbers of Tony Evers or Gretchen Whitmer. On the flip side I have never once seen anyone unironically say something like "The future of the Democratic Party is in the country clubs of Phoenix and Dallas" or say the best strategy would be for the Democrats to sell unions out completely to pander to millionaires in the Sun Belt. So if people would quit acting like there's a dichotomy of trying to win over Steve King's voters vs. making the Democratic Party a vehicle for country clubbers in sprawling suburbia that would go a long ways.

Another frequent strawmanning I see from the "clique" heatcharger mentioned is the notion that if anyone makes a comment that they believe a Senator or state or whatever is favored to win/lose or remain/flip that means that person and by extension the majority of the forum believes that's an absolute certainty, thus also leading to that pretty irritating "B-b-but..." meme if a single poll comes out that runs contrary to the narrative of any person who ever disagreed with them. Most of the time there isn't even a clear consensus on the topic at hand throughout the forum, yet many think any poll that comes out helping their prediction is proof they're an electoral genius standing against the tide.

Just a few examples. And yes, the presidential election forums have never been great, but these issues are way more pronounced and prominent than they have been in the past.

The only time most of any of us have used the word "populist" is to comment on the fact that it seems to have no real meaning anymore, other than a generic positive adjective for candidates people personally like. And I really haven't even done that much at all lately, either. The only example of the other "strawman" you mentioned that I can think of in my case is Biden, but there are people who literally do think he'll win 49 or 50 states, so I'm really not misrepresenting their argument, and just as they have every right to make it, I have every right to say why I disagree and think that it's premature to jump to such conclusions.

I'm all for a higher quality presidential board, but I also think people can lighten up a little bit. The occasional meme isn't going to kill anyone, even if they personally find it annoying and not funny.

Cite?

I've never seen anyone unironically claim this. So either:

-It hasn't been, and this is one of things people argue against because "they could see" someone making this argument, even if no one actually has or...
-It only appeared in a few posts, so some random troll or idiot newbie said it, and thus acting like it's a widespread serious belief worth mocking is indeed a strawman.

Here's an example of the sort of thing I'm talking about from today, and perfect for illustrating why the "B-b-but"/"But Atlas told me..." meme is so absurd:

But Atlas told me the Democrat has no chance of getting Whitmer's map or winning Bay or Macomb counties!

I'm not going to dispute that it's entirely possible someone said this at least once, but this is not exactly a talking point I've seen too often or even at all in any discussions of Michigan here. This "clique" seems to have adopted the mindset that if anyone ever states a prediction they disagree with, that instantly becomes the "Atlas consensus" and worthy of mockery if any evidence to the contrary shows up. This results in a rather surreal situation where two opposite sides are mocking the "conventional wisdom" of the opposite prediction, when of course it's literally impossible for two opposing views to be "conventional wisdom".

[Xing]

Well, here's one example:

There are more, and there's a thread in which many people think Biden winning all 50 states (including Vermont) is more likely than him not winning any. Just because you don't notice arguments made more than once doesn't mean that they aren't. And if the arguments of Biden winning 49-50 states are "ironic", how is that any different from what you're accusing other posters of doing?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Well, here's one example:

There are more, and there's a thread in which many people think Biden winning all 50 states (including Vermont) is more likely than him not winning any. Just because you don't notice arguments made more than once doesn't mean that they aren't. And if the arguments of Biden winning 49-50 states are "ironic", how is that any different from what you're accusing other posters of doing?

That's the primary and its obviously just a map of how current polls stand, not a prediction.

[💥💥 brandon bro (he/him/his)]

There are more, and there's a thread in which many people think Biden winning all 50 states (including Vermont) is more likely than him not winning any.

That's really obviously not a prediction of that Biden will win fifty states, it's saying (with the information we have now) it's highly unlikely for Biden to lose every state.

[Xing]

Well, here's one example:

There are more, and there's a thread in which many people think Biden winning all 50 states (including Vermont) is more likely than him not winning any. Just because you don't notice arguments made more than once doesn't mean that they aren't. And if the arguments of Biden winning 49-50 states are "ironic", how is that any different from what you're accusing other posters of doing?

That's the primary and its obviously just a map of how current polls stand, not a prediction.

Yes, and I was referring to the primary. I've never tried to say that people on Atlas thinks Biden will win all 50 states against Trump. I do remember a user back in 2016 who thought Hillary might win every state though, and that was pretty funny. Either way, my only point was that when I argue that Biden won't win every state in the primary, I'm not arguing against a non-existent viewpoint; there are people who currently believe that unironically. And that's probably the ONE recent example of my use of what could be considered a "strawman", so I'm really curious how it's so awful as to make me a key factor in how "unreadable" the 2020 board is, as the OP claims.