• Zaktor
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    2 months ago

    I love this bizarre narrative that the country who elected Obama and majority voted for Clinton is so racist and sexist that they’d be more supportive of a white man who can’t reliably form coherent sentences. Like yeah, racism and sexism is a thing, but it’s both not worse than public cognitive impairment and you’re deploying the specter of bigotry in order to implement its goals without even putting up a fight.

    • Cocodapuf@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      We did elect Obama, and look at the reaction that caused… The tea party, a completely obstructionist Congress who refused to consider anything the president touched and ultimately the election of Donald Trump.

      Obama was elected and half the country freaked the fuck out.

      • Monument@lemmy.sdf.org
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        2 months ago

        I remember telling people in early 2008 that racists would go apeshit and our entire political landscape would change if he win the primary/got elected, and being treated as if I was somehow racist at the time.

        In hindsight, I was wrong.
        Yes, what I predicted, and what you said did happen. But we’re wrong because Obama ran as a progressive, and promptly switched into being a milquetoast centrist democrat. What’s more, is that his supporters didn’t extend their support to other liberal causes.
        The tea party would have died on the vine if the Democratic Party let liberals feel empowered, rather than like pawns. And if his die-hard supporters had showed up in 2010, state legislatures wouldn’t have been able to gerrymander away/suppress turnout as much as they did - rendering his next 6 years fraught and an uphill battle.

        There are more liberal than conservative people in the U.S., but the Democratic Party does not engage with them, instead chasing the middle, and hoping the liberals hold their noses and cast their vote.

      • Zaktor
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        2 months ago

        Yes, and those people are a minority and already fully on board with the racist that built his political identity around being racist. Obama not only won, but won reelection. These are issues, but they’re already baked into the two parties, not a prescription for automatic failure.

        • Cocodapuf@lemmy.world
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          2 months ago

          Yes, and those people are a minority and already fully on board with the racist

          They’re a vocal minority that is managing to shift the opinions of the rest of the right, it’s a problem. If you think racism is not currently on the rise in the US, you should take another look.

          • Zaktor
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            2 months ago

            They’re already with Trump. There’s not some deep additional reservoir of hardcore racists just waiting to have a reason to join the explicitly racist party. And none of this is a question of “should we run Kamala or white male Kamala”, it’s Kamala or Joe, and Joe’s problem isn’t speculative and he’s going to suffer from exactly the same racism because everyone expects him to die.

      • ShepherdPie@midwest.social
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        2 months ago

        And Obama was then reelected years after the Tea Party formed and fizzled out. It’s like you’re arguing that only white men should run for president because women and minorities will wind up causing too many problems for the country.

        • Cocodapuf@lemmy.world
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          2 months ago

          It’s like you’re arguing that only white men should run for president because women and minorities will wind up causing too many problems for the country.

          Whoa! I said nothing like that! I think you know that’s a complete misrepresentation. I’m saying that there are too many people in this country (on both sides of the aisle) with racist and sexist leanings (that they may not even be aware of) for it to be likely for Harris to win right now. I think Harris would do a fine job if she did win.

          I just don’t trust the voters of this country to see past their biases. I think if Harris had been the candidate from the start we would have had time to combat those concerns and make her a viable candidate, but coming in late like this she’ll seem like a replacement, like the Democrats’ plan B. And that’s a harder position to win a campaign from, a position I don’t think is viable given America’s many biases.

    • ImADifferentBird@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      2 months ago

      Yes, Clinton won the popular vote, but she certainly didn’t win the election. And that was largely because of the systemic bias, which favors the more racist, sexist elements of this country.

      And Obama had to be the perfect candidate to win. A family man, no skeletons in his closet whatsoever, with a charisma the political world hasn’t seen since JFK. And his election brought those awful elements of our society to the fore, and touched off a fascist revolution that is still going on today, which the leader of won the presidency on the back of and is in danger of winning it again.

      This country does have a lot of racism and sexism. More than most would like to admit, including you, it seems. And Kamala Harris isn’t a strong enough candidate to overcome that, especially when you combine it with the other factors of having to unite a fractured party, coming into the race late, and being chosen at the convention rather than through the primary process.

      • Zaktor
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        2 months ago

        Obama won reelection, and Clinton was a bad candidate that lost on the margins in the EC. This isn’t a prescription for failure meaning we all need to be racist and sexist now. The people for whom racism and sexism is a guiding light are already baked into the electoral system. They have their party, and they have their king, and apart from this contest against Biden, they’ve been losing.

        And all of this is in comparison to a candidate who is visibly mentally declining. We’re not comparing Kamala to white male Kamala in talking about this transition.