Summary: It has become a virtual commonplace that Bernie Sanders’s supporters are some of the most enthusiastic campaign supporters any candidate has had in recent years. It’s also become a virtual commonplace that his supporters are some of the most belligerent, sexist, patronizing, and unoriginal campaign supporters in recent years. The Vermont senator’s supporters, most of whom appear to be young, white, male, and well-educated, don’t seem to have the self-awareness to realize that their lack of self-awareness with respect to their white male privilege, and even more, with respect to their educational privilege, is profoundly offputting to an increasingly large number of the electorate, a phenomenon that has been noted with increasing concern by an increasing number of mainstream and digital media outlets. Bernie, if anything undoes you, it will be in the intensity of your supporters. I love ya, Bern. But I’m ready for Hillary.
Back in June, so long ago now that it is almost ancient history, I posted an article in this blog entitled “Bernie Sanders’ Woman Problem.” In it, I suggested that Bernie was being ill-served by his more vocal supporters. Since then, articles suggesting the same thing have appeared in numerous mainstream and digital media outlets. All of them suggest the same thing; Bernie Sanders supporters are making it impossible to support their candidate.
Now let us be candid, and acknowledge that this Democratic primary season is very much like that of 2008. We Democrats have a supremely talented field from which to pick our nominee for the general election. Every single Democratic debate has been characterized by adult, mature discussion about policy, and every one has had the air of an intellectual conversation, among adult people, of a search to develop good policies and practices.
By contrast, of course, the Republican debates have been exercises in the coarsest demagoguery conceivable, of an insult to the intelligence a large part of the American people. Pandering to fear, invoking militant Nonconformist religion, and astonishingly light on actual policy, the Republican debates have been high school shouting matches. Between narcissistic expositions from Donald Trump, to Marco Rubio’s breathless mile a minute shouting, to Ted Cruz’s almost spot on imitation of discredited Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy, to the disgusting anti-choice lies peddled by disgraced HP executive Carly Fiorina, the Republican debates have demonstrated everything that is wrong with the GOP.
But if the Republican debates tell us a great deal about what is wrong with the GOP, and the Democratic debates have been, essentially, a vade mecum on how adult conversations about policy should happen, the Democratic debates have nevertheless let us down because the performance of the supporters of Senator Bernard Sanders.
It’s understandable that a candidate’s supporters will try to be zealous advocates for their candidate. However, the phenomenon that has emerged from the Sanders campaign is both disturbing and offputting. It has been noted over and over again that the comment thread of any article that mentions Hillary Clinton will be swarmed by Sanders supporters, usually young, white, well-educated men, determined to try to deflect any positive attention to the quondam Secretary of State. Their talking points are almost universally the same, and many of them sound as if they came directly from the opps research operation of the Republican National Committee.
What is worse, the usually tend to be misogynistic and sexist, entitled and patronizing, particularly when responding to commenters who do not necessarily share the same view. They share a disturbing degree of white male privilege, and an equally disturbing lack of self-awareness. Just a couple of examples will make the point.
First, many of the comments condemn Hillary Clinton for her husband’s legislative record. Yet, in the 21st century, we ought to insist that a woman, particularly woman seeking the presidency, be afforded the simple courtesy of conceding that she might have some agency. To blame Hillary for legislation passed on her husband’s watch is, as I suggested in my previous post on the subject, fundamentally antifeminist. It denies Hillary her own agency, and implicitly postulates that she has no identity separate from her husband. In the 21st century, such a posture ought to have no place, and for Bernie Sanders’s supporters to trot out such a rhetorical tactic is simply inadmissible.
Second, many Sanders supporters have attacked Hillary Clinton because, at the age of 17, more than 50 years ago, she volunteered for Barry Goldwater’s ill-fated 1964 Republican campaign. Yet, people evolve and change. To hold her participation in the long-ago and unsuccessful Goldwater campaign against her half a century later is the kind of totalitarian nonsense up with which no American should put. One can insist, with all the irritating entitlement commonly associated with the undergraduate left, on ironclad consistency and fidelity to so-called principle, but one can also insist, like King Canute’s courtiers, that the tides should not roll if the king commands it not roll. Most adult Americans have evolved on issues over their adult lives.
Case in point, how many straight Americans support marriage equality today who just five or 10 years ago would have found the prospect of Ruth and Naomi or Jonathan and David tying the knot and enjoying wedded bliss together offputting and unacceptable? Indeed, when I myself graduated from law school in 1989, neither my parents nor I were “ready” for marriage equality. Now, 26 years later, with marriage equality a reality in every American jurisdiction, my mother wonders when this gay man is going to settle down with a husband. Marriage equality implies marriage evolution, and the criticisms of Hillary that she has not been sufficiently militant on the subject are, quite frankly, a bunch of bunk.
Because, in truth, there has to be a statute of limitations beyond which volunteer work for Barry Goldwater or opposition to marriage equality is simply no longer fair game. The Spanish, in their wisdom, has made a pact of forgetting, El pacto de olvido, with respect to the awful events of the Spanish Civil War; where one stood or who one fought for in that conflict, or what one’s political views may have been during the conflict, is simply not a subject of discussion. Yet Sanders supporters love to hold grudges, and love to nurture aggrieved memories about what Hillary Clinton did or did not do long years ago. Again, this is the sort of nonsense up with which most reasonable Americans will not put.
The final point is this. Simply put, Bernie Sanders has not been well served by people professing to be his supporters. Some of them, I am sure, are Republican trolls, infiltrating among us to cause division and anger. But a larger proportion of them, I expect, are the kind of foolish knee-jerk liberals who do damage to every Democratic campaign conceivable with their ridiculous purism and unwillingness to face pragmatic fact. And because they all claim to be authentic supporters of Bernie Sanders, it is one of the infelicities of Bernie’s condition that insofar as this is the case, we take them at their word.
And because I love Bernie and loathe his over-the-top, patronizing, divisive supporters, as well as because I think Hillary Clinton is the better candidate, I will be casting my vote enthusiastically for Hillary Clinton should I have the opportunity to do so in the absurdly late June California primary election. Not because I dislike Bernie Sanders personally, but because I find his supporters troubling. Because when one elects a candidate, one elects many of his supporters as well, supporters who will be occupying patronage positions in a Sanders administration. Because I can’t trust Bernie’s supporters, and because I don’t want to see vindictive, patronizing, sexist loudmouths in any position of authority or responsibility, I support Hillary Rodham Clinton, and I will work in her campaign.
Of course, should Sanders be the nominee, I will support him and work in his campaign as well, although I would not be surprised to see some vindictive, score settling Berniebot do his or her level best to keep me far away from the campaign.
Because, in the end, it’s always the supporters who ruin things. It’s always those who want to out-Herod Herod who do the greatest damage to their candidate and their cause. It’s a pity Sen. Sanders has only recently begun to learn this lesson.
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