Wednesday's Most Active Threads

Much of the discussion yesterday involved politics. The most active thread was titled, "David Trone for senate" and was posted in the "Metropolitan DC Local Politics" forum. This thread was started just over a year ago when US Congressional Representative David Trone announced his run for Maryland's open US Senate seat. The reason the thread has so much interest now — adding 11 pages yesterday — is that on Tuesday, Trone lost his Senate bid, suffering defeat in the primary election to Prince Georges County Executive Angela Alsobrooks. Trone spent over $60 million of his own money on the campaign, making this an extraordinarily expensive defeat. Much of yesterday's discussion focused on Alsobrooks. Trone had a significant financial advantage and had been running commercials for a year. Polling, likely influenced by Trone's greater name recognition, generally showed him with a significant lead. The fact that Alsobrooks not only won, but won convincingly, came as a surprise to many, perhaps most, of those in this thread. Trone supporters had difficulty accepting it. One thing this thread does is to provide insight into how voters make choices. I am not sure that a single poster could name a single policy difference between Trone and Alsobrooks. Reactions are based almost entirely on personal characteristics. For instance, the fact that Trone is rich or that he came across to individuals in an unpleasant way. Alsobrooks is dinged for having been prosecutor previously and, in the view of some, as lacking charisma. Many posters express concerns that Alsobrooks, as a Black women, will not appeal to voters in many parts of Maryland. They are also worried that her opponent, former Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, will be a strong candidate with whom she will have difficulty competing. There is no doubt that Hogan is a credible challenger who will not be easily defeated. But many posters in this thread stress the significance of having a Democrat rather than a Republican being sent to the Senate. The Senate balance will impact everything from Supreme Court appointments to abortion rights. Personally, I think the concern about Alsobrooks' race and gender are overblown. Maryland recently elected a Black governor, so race shouldn't be a concern. Maryland has also previously elected a female Senator. Moreover, being a woman may give Alsobrooks an advantage. I have no evidence to back it up, but I think that there is an unspoken belief among many that, all things being equal, a women will be more likely to protect abortion rights than a man. I suspect that may explain some of Alsobrooks' strength against Trone. But, this is especially true when the woman's opponent, as will be the case with Hogan, explicitly opposes abortion. Many posters in this thread provide data from the primary voting to demonstrate why Alsobrooks should probably be considered the front-runner at this point. She showed strength in all Democratic strongholds. Hogan, on the other hand, lost 30% of the vote to a gadfly best known for heckling at basketball games. Nevertheless, persistent Trone fans refuse to see anything positive about Alsobrooks and throughout yesterday's posts continued negative attacks on her.

The next most active thread yesterday was posted in the "Elementary School-Aged Kids" forum. Titled, "Parents we are “friends” with fed our daughter fast food. Twice.", the original poster says that her family does not eat fast food. However, when her daughter recently spent the night with family friends, she was provided fast food for two meals. The original poster and her husband, who consider fast food to be "poisonous" are furious because they are worried that their daughter will develop a taste for fast food. First things first, is this poster a troll? The answer is that I don't know. I could only find a single other thread that the original poster started and that was on a completely different topic that sheds no light on whether the poster is trolling. Moreover, the original poster appears to have abandoned the thread after a single follow-up post. Before doing that, however, the original poster angrily reported several posts in which she was called a troll. Assuming the original poster was legitimate, she never really had a chance. Her position regarding fast food is extreme. Moreover, it is extreme in manner that causes other posters to react as if their own choices are being criticized. As such, the most common responses are to make fun of the original poster, chastise her, or defend fast food. Assuming the original poster is not trolling, a strongly held dietary restriction was violated. I am not sure why that could not have been addressed more seriously. What would the reaction have been if friends had intentionally fed a Jew or Muslim pork? Or, fed a vegetarian meat? I doubt it would have been as stridently in favor of the friends as was the case in this thread. On the other hand, what if the original poster actually is a troll? Trolls seek attention. So, is the best reaction really to respond with 16 pages of posts? Trolls don't care if you respond calling them a troll. They don't suffer troll demerits when you correctly call them out. That does not go down on their permanent record. To the contrary, you have fallen into their trap. When you respond to a troll, even if it is just to call them a "troll", you bump the thread to the top of the "Recent Topics" list as well as the top of its forum's listing. In other words, you exponentially increase the visibility of the thread and likely made the troll's day. Troll calling is, in effect, its own form of trolling. It disrupts threads, distracts from substantive content, and, when used in response to legitimate posters, discourages participation in the forums. When you read a post that you believe is a troll, responding to call the poster a "troll" is not an indication of your own brillance. To the contrary, it harms legitimate posters and, if the poster actually is a troll, helps them out. You are doing exactly the opposite of what you should be doing. If you think that a poster is a troll, the most punishing thing you can do to them is to ignore them. Nothing makes a troll more sad than not provoking a response. That seriously hurts their feelings.

Next was a thread titled, "NFL Kicker Harrison Butker’s unhinged commencement speech" which was posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. Harrison Butker is the kicker for the National Football League's Kansas City Chiefs. He recently delivered the commencement address at Benedictine College, a small Catholic college located in Atchison, Kansas. Butker took an extremely hardline approach to things, describing in vitro fertilization, contraception, homosexuality, abortion, gender ideology, and a number of other things as stemming from a pervasiveness of disorder. He also had considerable criticism for the Catholic Church, though most of that was because priests and other leaders are not extreme enough for his taste. While he criticized priests for having pictures taken with their pets, he did not mention anything about the many cases of child abuse that have plagued the Church. He also told the women graduates listening to him that despite the professional degrees they had earned, they should seek to primarily be homemakers, wives, and mothers. The original poster of the thread uses the speech to warn others that "they" are coming for Catholics who don't adhere to far right ideology and will purge the Church of disloyal Catholics. It is not clear who "they" is, but it may be a motley crew of NFL kickers, in which case I don't think there is much cause for concern. Nevertheless, Butker's address is extreme and offensive to many posters. On the other hand, a number of posters defend him, or at least reject any criticism of him. I'll take this opportunity to address a phenomenon that I've witnessed many times on DCUM and that definitely occurred in this thread. Especially among right-wing posters there is a frequent tendency to argue that strongly-held beliefs, particularly those based on religion, should not be questioned. In response to one poster's criticism of Butker's speech, another replied, "He’s Catholic. And you are a bigot." Even those Butker defenders who were less extreme seemed to believe that his religion or the fact that he was speaking at a Catholic school gave him some sort of "get out of jail free" card. "He is saying what he believes to people who believe similar things and that makes it okay" went the argument. No, that is exactly the problem. The fact that people believe these things is precisely why they must be confronted and challenged. Many posters in this thread accuse those like the original poster of engaging in "sky is falling rhetoric". The same things were said about warnings that abortion rights were in danger. Posters were called Chicken Littles for alerting that Roe vs. Wade was threatened. The sky was falling and it continues to fall. To simply ignore this sort of rhetoric in the name of tolerance is a mistake. Butker has every right to say these things and his critics have every right to express their disagreement. That is not religious bigotry or intolerance. To the contrary, I would say that it is a necessity.

The final thread that I will discuss today was also posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. Titled, "When did you stop identifying with the liberal progressives?", the original poster asks how long others considered themselves "progressive", to provide some personal background information, and explain when they stopped identifying as progressive. First some clarification on my part. As I have written before, I started these blog posts as a way to simply generate changing content for DCUM's home page. I didn't expect many people to read them and I personally thought summaries of DCUM threads would be boring. I tend to view the most active threads primarily as writing prompts. If they inspire me to write my own thoughts, I do so. If not, I stick closer to simply summarizing the thread. Most of the time I do a little of both. With threads like this, I have enough to say that I don't really feel like talking about the thread at all beyond the first post. Whether what I have to say is of interest to anyone but me is another question entirely. If it doesn't interest you, I fully respect that. Feel free to skip. You can even leave a snide comment if you want. Back to the thread. I have definitely noticed a trend of posters saying that they used to be progressive but no longer identify as such. This most commonly happens in relation to gender identity issues or, more recently, due to the Israel-Gaza war. Like the original poster of this thread, posters who say that they are no longer progressive argue that they haven't changed, but progressives moved too far to the left. Personally, I attribute this to age. It is obviously not universal. For instance, I still identify as a progressive despite being firmly in AARP's sights and that is to say nothing of Bernie Sanders. But, as a general matter, I think the idea has some validity. Progressivism is most popular among the young. If you think about it, youth is a time of exploration in which change is embraced. Rebellion and non-conformity are almost expected. The young are often idealistic and not yet tarnished by the cynicism that often comes with age. As such, they are progressivism's natural constituency. With age, I think there is increased interest in stability. Change can introduce risk and, with more to lose, adults can be risk adverse. They become set in their ways. I would wager that the original poster is correct that she hasn't changed with one important exception. She no longer finds change as nearly as appealing as she once may have done. Many of those who oppose the college campus protests against Israel's war in Gaza are quick to point out that they once similarly protested Apartheid in South Africa, as did I. For me, that makes me more sympathetic to today's protesters. But others argue that our cause was right but today's cause is not. Yes, our cause was right, but just like today, adults told us it was wrong. It's good that we didn't listen. Without change there can be no improvement. Society will stagnate. So, yes, progressivism has changed. That is necessary in order to achieve a better world. The original poster did not change, and, hence, cannot identify with today's progressives. That is very predictable if nonetheless disappointing.