Melania: define bully

[GoblinCampFollower]

We are dangerously moving into territory where feels/opinion are given equal weight to facts.

I hope that isn't what you mean, at all.

Facts and not feels are what matters in the physical sciences and math.

 

[Shiloh Lyric]

In any case, I will agree to disagree. My beliefs on this issue are subjective, so I can't prove them and you can't refute them.

But here's the thing...you are most certainly entitled to your own opinion. If you feel no one should criticize Melania, that's it's akin to bullying, that's your rightful opinion to hold. What you're not entitled to, are your own facts. There have been facts about Melania which seem to refute the basis for your opinion that she is being bullied and shouldn't be.

I'm very consistently against going after the families of famous people for guilt by association. I always think that if one of my crazy, right wing relatives ran for office, I'd not want to be associated with it.

We have explained how it's not guilty by association. Again, she was a birther. She did that on her own. She wore a tone-deaf jacket, no matter who the message was directed towards, while going to see children who were ripped from their parents. She did that. No one else.

Her hyperbole was silly, and she's obviously cracking. She's not as strong as previous first ladies. She's guilty of being a gold digger, and guilty of being fragile. I don't agree she is guilty of much more than that.

See above. She's guilty of more. Of the hypocrisy of spear-heading an anti-bullying campaign, using the slogan #BeBest, while living with the biggest buillier of all time. Hypocrisy isn't innocent. It's deliberate. Of encouraging a regime veering toward fascism with a smile on her face. No one has a gun to her head. She appears quite willing, and has made it obvious, on several occasions, that she is her own woman.

She's not being criticized because people are anti-Trump and she's just getting some of the mud splattered on her from standing too close. No. She's being criticized because people are anti-Melania and anti the increasing emergence of her own authoritarian streak.

So, yes, you can have whatever subjective opinion you want. But we can consider it invalid, and point out all the objective reasons why.

 

[Cristiano]

We seem to be going down a bit of a rabbit hole about "refute". It is true, you can't refute someone's opinion. You can disagree with it and show your reasons why they are wrong to hold that opinion, but the opinion itself cannot be refuted.

 

[Jolene Benoir]

We seem to be going down a bit of a rabbit hole about "refute". It is true, you can't refute someone's opinion. You can disagree with it and show your reasons why they are wrong to hold that opinion, but the opinion itself cannot be refuted.

Can we, at least, say, "Nanabooboo, your opinion would be better if it were posted on the backside of a donkey?"

Asking for a friend.

 

[Free]

We seem to be going down a bit of a rabbit hole about "refute". It is true, you can't refute someone's opinion. You can disagree with it and show your reasons why they are wrong to hold that opinion, but the opinion itself cannot be refuted.

We should have a poll on this.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

...There have been facts about Melania which seem to refute the basis for your opinion that she is being bullied and shouldn't be.

Whether or not she is being bullied simply isn't a falsifiable claim. So this discussion is a dead end. But do you know what is a falsifiable claim? I fear that attacks on the first lady make swing voters more sympathetic to the President. Attacks on her can actively hurt other efforts in addition to just time lost. That's what's really been on my mind since long before this thread started. It doesn't matter if people here are "right" if swing voters still take sympathy with her. People here aren't voting republican either way. I'm far more worried about how people on the fence see it. The "feels" of swing voters can defeat the facts on election day.

I'd love to see an actual study on how attacks on the first lady affect swing voters, since I couldn't find one. Although I couldn't find a study directly addressing this, it looks like Melania's approval rating is about 12 points higher than Donald's, so it sounds likely that some swing voters like her, but might consider voting against Donald. If a study refuted my fear that attacks on her hurt the left, I'll never protest attacking her again. That's the most important goalpost to me.

EDIT: I wanted to add to this post, that I know Trump won while being an ass, but I simply don't think dem's can get away with that kind of mud slinging. Trump had an ability to benefit from lowered expectations that isn't easy to replicate.

 

[Free]

By the way, this thread's pearls have been clutched enough.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

By the way, this thread's pearls have been clutched enough.

But.... but... being out numbered helps my post count!

 

[Jolene Benoir]

But.... but... being out numbered helps my post count!

I give you credit. It's not often that the majority of the board disagrees with someone, and they don't come out swinging with, "Hive Mind, Voodoo-Hoodoo."

You've held your own, though I do disagree with some tactics.

Not going to address the latest post about whether or not being big meanie-poops turns voters from sweet and nice people into voting for an authoritarian, despotic villain, because then I might actually get angry.

 

[Free]

Not going to address the latest post about whether or not being big meanie-poops turns voters from sweet and nice people into voting for an authoritarian, despotic villain, because then I might actually get angry.

I'll wait for the "study."

 

[Pancake]

By the way, this thread's pearls have been clutched enough.

Pearls?
Yikes. I thought they were beads so I was uh... clutching... a little longer than usual.

Gimme two more minutes and I’ll be done with them.

 

[Free]

Gimme two more minutes and I’ll be done with them.

I'll be in my bunk.

 

[Free]

Long before she was "First Lady", she publicly pushed the lie that President Obama was born in Kenya. She not only went along with it, she helped propagate it. She deserves scorn for that alone, if nothing else

Forget Elizabeth Warren’s DNA Test. Never Forget That Melania and Donald Trump Are Birthers

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

I give you credit. It's not often that the majority of the board disagrees with someone, and they don't come out swinging with, "Hive Mind, Voodoo-Hoodoo."

You've held your own, though I do disagree with some tactics.

Thanks.

Not going to address the latest post about whether or not being big meanie-poops turns voters from sweet and nice people into voting for an authoritarian, despotic villain, because then I might actually get angry.

I understand why my insistence in being nice sounds absurd with how Trump won, but I really don't think Dem's can get away with 1% of the mud slinging Trump pulled. He benefited from lowered expectations and 30 years of right wing propaganda. Even many of his supporters thought he needed to tone down his act. I think his comments about Cruz's wife hurt him too. ...just not enough to stop him.

Dem's are expected to be the nice party. If we sink to Trump's level, he'll beat us on experience. And remember, it's not about whether this makes sense to us, it's about what makes sense to people way more right wing than us (but not so right wing they are guaranteed to vote republican).

 

[Free]

Dem's are expected to be the nice party.

lol.

There are ways to make you look like an imbecilic piece of shit and not be involved in a single tossing of mud.

 

[Pancake]

I think maybe the miscommunication is the difference between off limits and carte blanche.

I don’t believe anyone is saying families of celebrities and politicians should be criticized when they have done nothing except for be related to a celebrity.

However, when they take advantage of their privilege as celebrity family member to get a TV interview or press scrum or photo op and use it to deliver their own message, that’s fair game.

The same argument that they shouldn’t be criticized just because of their family member works in reverse, they shouldn’t get a free pass for their own actions and opinions just because of their family member. Using that privilege to say whatever you like without recourse is not a far step from getting out of speeding tickets because of family member, or worse.

 

[Jolene Benoir]

I hereby request that all of my opinions shall now be unchallenged, from this point forward. I am related to someone famous (not really, but I'm going to claim it, because I am famous in my own mind).

I also request that any responses also be only nice, sweet and full of rainbows and ponies, most definitely not pies to the face (yes, I know you want to, but you must resist).

 

[Sid]

The First Lady is clearly in the Trumptydumpty camp and not only privately involved with the orange hairpiece.
So she can expect the pitch and feathers from their opponents, just as the rest of the politically active family members.

 

[Ashiri]

Dem's are expected to be the nice party. If we sink to Trump's level, he'll beat us on experience. And remember, it's not about whether this makes sense to us, it's about what makes sense to people way more right wing than us (but not so right wing they are guaranteed to vote republican).

That's a problem. IMHO you really need some wild-eyed socialists to shake things up.

 

[Jolene Benoir]

That's a problem. IMHO you really need some wild-eyed socialists to shake things up.

That makes sense. The Overton window consistently keeps moving to the right, as they get more and more outlandish, while branding even middle-of-the-road and democratic ideas as Communism coming to take your wives/your children/your homes.

Maybe it's time to nudge that window.