Laurie Penny at the DNC: "Dissent will not be tolerated. Protest will not be permitted."

boing
41

If the perception of Sanders supporters is that dissent will not be tolerated and protest will not be permitted, then dismissing that perception as ridiculous is likely to only alienate those Sanders supporters. It would probably be more effective to make a fact-based argument for your position.

Same thing, but being insufferably condescending is even more alienating than simply dismissing the perceptions of others. Again, this is unlikely to convince anyone you are correct, and given human psychology, is actually fairly likely to push your audience towards doubling down on their current perspectives rather than reconsider them.

6 Likes
42

Damn right! If you want to write in Bernie or Jill or Micky Mouse for President go right ahead, but at least vote for/against the Congresscritter or Senator in your local area. That will help Bernie in more ways than one.

6 Likes
43

After the election dust settles, ordinary Americans should actually roll up their sleeves and get about fixing their party’s nomination process. Get politically-involved and make sure that in 3-ish years when it’s time to have another nomination race, all the inequities and irregularities and outright corruption you’re pointing at now get fixed, so that this can’t happen again.

But that’s not what’s going to happen. Instead, the progressives who didn’t quite get their way refuse to compromise at all. They’ll sit on their hands when their vote is so sorely needed to keep a monster from sitting upon the world’s most powerful throne. You are not victims of an oppressive regime, you are entitled whiners. You have the tools and the means and the voices at your disposal to forge change OVER TIME, but you prefer to gnash your teeth and talk about how unfair life is RIGHT AT THIS MOMENT. That is not democracy in action, that’s a temper tantrum because you didn’t get your way.

If the BernieBros are truly so grief-stricken as they claim, then I expect to see the next four years spent by American progressives pushing for party reform, hard. Otherwise, they’re just hypocrites.

8 Likes
44

Hmm well let’s see what she ends up pursuing once in office. Maybe I will be wrong.

Though I am not sure why several of those things weren’t already on her list.

3 Likes
45

I’m not sure what ‘facts’ you had in mind. Where the DNC is concerned, dissent was not only tolerated, it led to a change in the DNC platform. Protest was absolutely permitted. Did you see people being kicked out? Protesters were acknowledged, and when protests continued, Sanders took the protesters aside to speak with them, hear their concerns, and talk to them about what they want to achieve. His entire speech could be seen as a plea to those protesters as to why Hillary is speaking for them.

10 Likes
46

An HRC administration is going to be a neoliberal shit sandwich. Anyone who tells you different either A) doesn’t see it for what it is, or B) is in a comfortable enough position in life that they can’t. I still think she should win, but I can’t buy into the hype that the Sandersites won. That hype is dangerous.

10 Likes
47

Wait, I though they were centrists?

No, wait, I thought she was a neo-con “Republican lite”?

Now they’re neoliberals!

This is all so confusing to people who just want her to do her job and don’t throw labels around or make assumptions about people’s behavior before they’ve had a chance to do things.

2 Likes
48

11 Likes
49

Stop being so confusing! Left or right: choose one!

To clarify: you want her to go left, right?

No, no, no.

The correct response for “We aren’t being heard” isn’t either of “You’re being ridiculous, of course we’re listening,” or “You’re right, we don’t care what you think.”

It’s, “All right, we’re listening now. What did you want to say?”

ETA: And then actually listening.

5 Likes
50

What about all the Sanders supporters who showed up to protest?

4 Likes
51

I made this thread for trying to keep track of some of the info I’ve been gleaning from the web. I want to make this easy for folks! :slight_smile:

1 Like
52

Everybody’s ignoring the elephant in the room, which is the American electorate.

Back in 2009, Democrats in Congress were hard at work on the Affordable Care Act. It wasn’t perfect, but it still benefited a lot of people. It turned out that some of the people it benefited were petty and small-minded and they said, “I don’t want these benefits if [African-Americans] and [undocumented workers] are going to get them too! I don’t want these benefits if it means that [sexually-active single women] are going to be able to get birth control, and [people who want gender-reassignment therapy] are going to be able to [get gender-reassignment therapy]!”

Obviously they didn’t use the words I’ve enclosed in brackets. They used different words, which I won’t repeat here. Anyway, they were so passionate about it that Republicans were able to use this issue to take over both houses of Congress in 2010, and they still hold control today.

The Democrats had to figure out how to respond to this. They could have moved further to the left, in hopes of picking up some votes from the fringe, or they could have moved to the right, in hopes of capturing a bigger share of the large centrist voting bloc. If you look at the relative sizes of the two groups, then that’s an easy decision to make.

And the vote counts from this year’s election are going to determine the party’s future. If Trump manages to win, then the Democrats will move further to the right. They’ll need to pick a few minority groups to jettison; undocumented workers will probably be at the top of the list. I mean, having principles is nice, but it’s kind of futile to have principles without enough votes to implement at least some of them.

If Clinton wins the election by 0-5 points, then the Democratic Party’s positions will stay about where they are today. If she wins by 5-10 points, then the party will feel that it’s safe to move a bit further to the left. If she wins by 10 points or more, then that will show that there’s an appetite for a genuine progressive shift.

What I’m seeing from the polls is that the American People as-a-whole want the Democratic Party to keep its positions about where they are today. If some people aren’t happy about that, then there’s no point in them whining about the DNC. They need to take their fight to the people-as-a-whole.

9 Likes
53

13781937_1156859251045079_4401503715580333547_n.jpg701×598 68 KB

26 Likes
54

Those are facts, and that is a good fact-based response, assuming you are interpreting “dissent will not be tolerated. protest will not be permitted” correctly. (Note that I’m not the one saying it, I’m just the one saying your means of convincing others to change their minds leaves something to be desired.)

But as @nimelennar points out, maybe you should try to figure out what that statement actually means before scorning people for thinking it.

If Clinton and the DNC have taken actions that make Sanders supporters feel that way, then that’s a problem whether or not the perception is an accurate description of the reality. That is, it’s a problem if you want their buy-in or if you want to convince them of the correctness of your perspective. If you don’t care about any of that, then you can keep stamping your feet.

5 Likes
55

“Fake adopt”

6 Likes
56

Which politician is that, Trump or Clinton? Because I’m not seeing a politician saying things I agree with anymore. Are you?

8 Likes
57

Not a helpful addition to a debate. Are you baselessly assuming their inclusion in her platform and the DNC’s are lies?

3 Likes
58

Jill Stein says tons of things I agree with. In fact, it’s hard to find anything she says that I don’t agree with.

7 Likes
59

I don’t really care if you think it is “helpful” given all of your responses above. You’re clearly bought into the razzle dazzle of the Clinton campaign.

They’re non-binding. They can promise whatever they want and, come the first day of office, ignore these promises with no penalty. She’s not a progressive. She’s a center-right, pro-bank, pro-business candidate funded by SuperPACs and fat cat (plutocrat) donors. She’s not a friend of the working people that are so angry and desperate for jobs at this point that they’ll back a thug like Trump. Those people aren’t going to go away because Clinton isn’t actually going to do anything to help them or other non-working Americans. She’s going to help the owner class of corporations, hedge funds, etc. You think this is a rough election cycle? Wait until the 2020 or 2024 overt fascists show up on Trump’s coat-tails.

Progressives lost (again) this cycle and the overall multi-decade economic decline for most Americans will just continue its slide to the third world. As long as the rich fucks have theirs, why will our political class care? They know who pays for them and their campaigns.

14 Likes
60

Much thanks for the info!! It will come in handy!