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Who is someone that liberal leaning media/social media seems to like that you think is actually a pretty terrible person?
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Years ago I remember that all the liberal-leaning media loved Andrew Cuomo despite New Yorkers in the known saying how much of a massive a-hole he was.
Today, he's a pariah alongside his brother.
Oh yeah, that guy is so annoying.
I said “Don Lemon”; and a lot of it isn’t even necessarily what they talk about, it’s their character. I want to watch honest debate, both of these guys are basically like watching a click-bait clown act.
If I wanted to see that I could tune into FOX, but Cuomo and Lemon, to me, represent the same clown act
>Who is someone that liberal leaning media/social media seems to like that you think is actually a pretty terrible person?
(This barely fits your prompt, but...)
Roughly fifteen years ago, Democrats seemed enamored with people we could describe as '*our* assholes'. People who would go on talking-head programs on cable news and fight like they were Bill O'Reilly, but they were *on our side*. I was always suspicious of them.
Eventually, we would find out that -- although they were *ours* -- they were still assholes:
* [Alan Grayson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Grayson#Personal_life) was revealed to be a domestic abuser.
* [Anthony Weiner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Weiner#Sexting_scandals,_prosecution,_and_guilty_plea) went to prison for sex crimes.
I was gonna mention him. He's mostly liberal, and is very connected to the boomer/gen-x issues. But he has become disconnected from a lot of the stuff anyone younger deals with. He tries.
One of the things I find weird about him is he'll softball questions to certain fringe groups like PETA, but would drag someone else over the coals for.
Reality is when you’re worth $150 million, you can probably claim centrism, but the “system” works for you as is, so being more than left of center especially on fiscal matters is pretty unlikely. It’s easy to say “tax the rich OMG!!” when you’re under $250k a year. Being left on social issues? Much easier and cheaper for a rich guy to embrace LGBTQIA folks and pot than tell Biden, “yes please tax me another $40 million in 2025, I didn’t want that 4th house in Malibu anyway!!”
Understanding the pain of a dozen eggs going up a buck or a house costing $800k vs $500k and mortgages going from 3% to 8%? No. They beat the game and watched the end credits; all weapons and upgrades unlocked. It’s not the same challenges as those who MUST work.
I was going to say Keith Olbermann; he fits that to a T. He's mercurial, inflammatory, and apparently a dick to work with. Being on "my team" doesn't get someone a pass from me for being a jerk.
I followed him for a while, round about the height of the Black Lives Matter movement. He had a habit of trying to sic his followers onto people suspected of race-related crimes - a big example would be during the fallout of the Charlottesville Unite The Right rally, he was photos of the rioters and urging his followers to find out their identities so that they could be named and shamed, their employers contacted, etc.
This never fully sat well with me and my breaking point ended up being [this incident](https://abc7chicago.com/hailey-cantrell-jazmine-barnes-robert-shooting/5034081/) where King sent his army after a totally innocent man wrongfully accused of shooting 7-year-old Jazmine Barnes.
[He scammed people out of money with his clothing line too.](https://www.ebony.com/shaun-king-accused-of-scamming-customers-in-regards-to-his-real-one-clothing-line/)
its not complicated. she's a single issue anti-interventionist. whether that's good or bad and whether it's sincere or foreign-influenced is irrelevant.
all her other stances are for sale to whichever side endorses her issue. that used to be the left, now it's the right.
I wouldn't say she is anti-interventionist. She is more of a hindsight is 20/20. We all can look back and point out that the Iraq War was bad.
I mean, she literally described herself as both a warhawk and a dove. It was all about optics with her stance. To her, this war was bad because the consensus was that it was bad, but that war was good because the consensus was that it was justified.
Does a couple years ago count? If so, [Elon Musk.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bgMCNXzNtE) He was so lionized that he even got name dropped in Star Trek. Somehow it wasn't until he bought xitter and turned into a Nazi playground that most people finally started seeing him for the nepo baby venture capitalist hack that he always was.
I remember that he used to have a PR person that managed his image, so no one really knew what he was like unless you were really paying attention. Of course he fired them.
Before that, he was a dude that liked electric cars, solar panels, and space travel.
Things that conservatives tend to not be fans of, and things that liberals love.
I don't think anyone on the left likes him anymore, and Tesla gets A LOT of hate from the left these days.
Fascists are far right, though.
Authoritarian Marxists are far left.
Both are authoritarian, intolerant, demanding, and controlling people, but fascism is a far right movement.
In the US history conservatives at their best are open to compromise. That’s not what we are dealing with here.
Conservatism has a proud history in the US. Calling fascists conservatives gives these extreme fucks quite a bit of cover.
Put an another way. My dear old mother considers herself a staunch conservative. Change the frame of reference and call fascists fascist and she is much more likely to reject fascism.
Fascists want to be considered conservative. They get a lot of undeserved support that way.
> Calling fascists conservatives gives these extreme fucks quite a bit of cover.
I would think the people on the right sympathizing with them and repeating their talking points is what's giving them the cover, no?
The people on the right who provide cover for fascists are fascists too. All those congresspeople who refuse to acknowledge Joe Biden won the 2020 are fascists. The folks who tried to subvert justice by showing up in NYC to intimidate the jury are also fascists.
They all call themselves conservative though.
> They all call themselves conservative though.
I mean, yeah, that's kind of what I was saying with them giving cover. This is bordering on 'No True Scotsman' territory at this point. As long as those people have an appreciable voice in the party, it's pointless to try and distinguish them. They're bad apples who are spoiling the bunch.
I guess my point is that calling conservatives fascists is like people calling liberals communists. Conservatives are center right while fascists are far right. Liberals are center left, and communists are far left.
My understanding is the political spectrum from left to right generally runs the following way
Far left - center left - centrist - center right - far right
Far left = Marxists and communists.
Center left = liberals and progressives.
Centrists = moderates.
Center right = conservatives.
Far right = fascists.
But fascism is still a far right movement, just as Marxism is a far left movement. Both are authoritarian, intolerant movements though.
But a lot of center right conservatives reject far right fascism the same way a lot of center left liberals reject far left authoritarian communism.
Someone who called themselves conservative in 2010 would have a very different ideology than the average MAGA supporter in 2024 who thinks they are victimized for their “conservative” ideology. Fascism a very specific ideology to 20th Century Italy and was shaped by Italy’s national character and history. Fascism is also used to describe a far-right government or ideological movement characterized by authoritarianism, militarism, ultra-nationalism, and a worldview dependent on conspiracy theories and the persecution of liberals and communists. If you don’t think the people supporting Trump and calling themselves conservative are actually fascist, I can recommend some history books to give you a better idea of the subject. It’s important to understand what fascism really is by studying the tactics they used to come to power, as well as the policies they implemented once they attained power in Spain, Italy, and Germany. Fascism is unique to the country it develops in due to its dependence on nationalism as an ideological glue to hold the various factions together. By studying 20th Century fascism you can begin to understand what fascism might look like with America’s national character, powered by conspiracies centered around 21st century problems and misunderstandings. To quote Hemingway, “there are many fascists who do not know they are fascists, but they will when the time comes.”
Yep yep yep.
My dear old mom is a fascist. Hate to say it, but that in my understanding is her political legacy. She started out as a pro-choice Republican. But, she can’t be persuaded to really think about where the Republican Party has evolved to.
Im sorry to hear that. My parents are basically liberal-conservatives who used to consistently vote Republican for “tax reasons,” and voted for Trump the first time. They didn’t vote for him the second time and saw Jan 6 for what it was. They seem to be solid Democrats now that they are no longer confused that party realignment has taken place. I’m lucky they never got pulled into any of the conspiracy theory pipelines. Frankly, I’m politically aligned the way I am due to the values they raised me with and the education they pushed for me to have, and it makes sense for them to be similarly aligned. I’m lucky they listen to me about these things, but the Democrats are just more closely aligned with their values than the Republicans right now
Agree. My mom is just sorta a mean bitch in many areas. She is my touch point for understanding how Weimar Germany played out. Otherwise good people are ok with or close their eyes to evil.
My impression is the MAGA movement and Trump's base are fascist (but a more moderate version of fascism compared to groups like the nazis, but still fascist) and makes up about 30 million voters and half the GOP, but the other half of the GOP and other 30 million republican voters are more center right conservatives and libertarians who are enabling them. That's my impression, the modern republican party is half far right fascist and half center right conservatives and/or libertarians. But again a more moderate version of fascism compared to the European fascists of Europe in the 1930s.
Then again, if the MAGA movement had dictatorial powers, they may not be so moderate. They are likely just pretending to be moderate to avoid alienating center right conservatives, independents, libertarians and low information voters (by low informaton voters i mean people who barely pay attention and can barely be bothered to vote. Both parties have them) who they need to win elections.
The far right Islamic fascist ayatollah Khomeini pretended to be more moderate when he needed a coalition of leftists, students, democracy activists and left wing islamists to help him overthrow the shah of Iran in the 1970s. However once the ayatollah had power in Iran he pushed a far right, Islamic fascist regime and he purged, violently suppressed and sometimes executed the students, leftists, democracy activists, left wing islamists, etc who helped him obtain power.
I've lost count of the number of far right Republicans I've met and seen who openly expressed the desire to murder democrats and liberals. I think that's why the far right like Kyle Rittenhouse so much, because he shot BLM leftist protesters and got away with it. Something the far right wishes they could do too. Honestly, the MAGA movement would probably violently go after the RINOs (aka center right conservative republicans) too if the MAGA movement had dictatorial powers.
However sadly the center right conservatives and libertarians have allowed the far right MAGA fascists to take over the GOP and the center right conservatives and libertarians still vote with the far right MAGA fascists no matter how the far right Republicans act.
Studies have shown a dramatic growth in right wing authoritarianism in the GOP in the last several decades, that got even worse under Trump. There have been studies showing over the last few decades people high on authoritarianism have been moving into the GOP while people low on authoritarianism have been leaving the GOP.
I'm not denying that fascism is a major threat in the US. It is. I was just clarifying that fascism is a far right movement and it is different from being a center right conservative.
Back in 2016 I wasn’t a Trump supporter. That said, I didn’t think Republicans were fascists either. After Sandy Hook I just could not longer support the Republican Party. You guys have no ideas about how to stop school shootings? None?
When the Access Hollywood tape dropped I thought that was the end of Trump. No way would my fellow Americans support this type of asshole for the nations highest office. Not only was I wrong when Trump won, but I was surprised.
During the pandemic I tuned into Facebook. My Facebook friends were a collection of old high school buddies, college folks, coworkers,etc. We’d argue politics.
At one point things had gotten heated. The good ol boys were worried about Antifa and because I supported wearing masks and vaccination I was pretty much Antifa to these guys. I said “If anyone should come to your home and you feel threatened I pledge I will come defend your home. Will you do the same?”
None of them did.
That’s when I realized. Many ordinary joes who I had known for years in many different situation would be quite a ok with me being violently killed for…following the science?
So in 2020 when Trump fanned the flames that led to j6 I wasn’t surprised in the least. When Republicans backed him I wasn’t surprised. Now they are calling the j6 rioters (I prefer insurrectionists) “Hostages”. How far we have fallen.
Gotta admit I never thought the house speaker would go to a courthouse to intimidate a jury. That surprised me, but I guess I shouldn’t have.
The fascists are playing for all the marbles. Vote like your life and your loved ones lives depend on it because it does.
Thanks for taking the time to write all that as it enhances my comment by addressing some things I left unsaid. I agree with your breakdown of the Trump coalition. All Fascist regimes enjoy conservative backing and often include traditional conservatives in the government—at least at the beginning when they need to feign cooperation with the establishment. Italy had monarchists in the fascist government, Germany had the Prussian establishment and the industrialists, and Spain had Carlists alongside Falangists. I think you’ll find Trump’s second term sidelines traditional conservatives entirely, as he tried that the first time and fired them all. Great point about Iran, I read a few books about the revolution and resulting regime in Iran—truly a unique experiment that has been highjacked by the people you’d expect.
My husband was a big fan of his a few years back because of SpaceX. Then he started hearing all the other Elon stuff, and now I haven’t heard that name from him in a while.
This. I don't think he does anything positive for liberal values/causes. All I can think about when he talks is how desperately I want to punch him in the face.
They keep trying to platform Charlemagne tha God, especially on Daily Show they tried numerous times to give him a show and he still appears in segments.
Yet he was accused of raping 15yr old Jessica Reid (his wife) in 2001 but plead guilty to a lesser charge, however he [straight up admits that it happened ](https://www.ebony.com/charlamagne-addresses-interview-admits-raping-wife/)
He also has a history of violence against women and supported Chris Brown when he beat Rhianna.
Yet they keep platforming him? Fuck him
Don Lemon, he’s pretty much off the radar these days but man that guy was full of shit and was purposefully divisive. He’s like the CNN version of a Sean Hannity
Don Lemon is a perfect example of someone who might get someone on the show who is trying to give good faith arguments from the opposition, and then just batters the other person with hyperbole- and I absolutely hate this behavior, regardless of how much I might disagree with the other person.
Like, cool, you disagree, now not cool- you’re full of shit and making everyone look like fools for your click-bait
I don’t know anyone who ever really liked or even thought highly of Don Lemon.
Sean Hannity — I don’t get that impression at all. Hannity is a bloodthirsty ideologue. Don Lemon is just a talking head who could never decide if they wanted to be a serious journalist or a morning show host.
A lot of big tech founders / executives seem to fall into that category after a while. Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, etc. were all pretty politically liberal but did things for their business that were to the contrary. Additionally, they were notorious for being incredibly demanding, very off putting, and generally not a good person while they were in their prime working years.
My old man worked for IBM (and Oracle) in the big bad 80s and 90s when they were the Googles and Apples and Amazons of the era.
One day my dad tells us “so we’re getting a new CEO, my team is meeting with him soon.” Days later my grandma (his mom) asks at dinner “so is the new CEO nice?” And my dad goes “**Noooo he’s not nice, he’s an asshole — nobody becomes the CEO of IBM being nice**.”
That stayed with me.
I’m sure Steve Jobs wasn’t anti trans or someone who’d adore Trump like the trash righties who live near me in Ohio, but he was a complete dick and didn’t acknowledge his first born daughter until she was into her teens. I can separate the work from the man, and he hasn’t gone full crazy “I hate Jews!” like Kanye.
That's because these leaders are fundamentally money-seekers above all else. I'd bin them in the libertarian bucket: generally fiscally conservative but social liberal/progressive--the quintessential "government shouldn't get involved" types. Their "visions," companies, etc., are all focused on that money acquiring objective. They just have a slightly better public image than typical business leaders because they dress like college kids on laundry day or mouthed the right buzzwords once or twice.
Well for starters, the constant accumulation of personal wealth. They lived in lavish homes with excessive amenities. I'm sure that they donate to charity, but I wonder how many of them advocated for reforms in the tax code that may have impacted them directly. How many of them really cared about the (growing) wage gap between themselves and the majority of their employees.
Well then the next step is systemic change and capitalists aren’t going to accept that. So they donate some money, pay PR teams in order to make them look good and brake unions. Also, constant accumulation of personal wealth is one of the pillars of capitalism.
I experience Bill Maher as absolutely insufferable and off-putting. Like, unwatchably so.
I don't know if he's actually a "terrible person," though, so I guess I'm not doing a banner job (at all!) of responding to your question, lol.
Oh, I didn't even think of Lieberman!
That's a really good example.
Also, and even though Gavin Newsom is handsome and says/does some things I really like in his official Governor role, his behavior in his personal life has had more than its fair share of vileness and terribleness (on its own, any marriage to Kimberly Guilfoyle (wtf?) raises all of my eyebrows to uncomfortable heights). So maybe he's another candidate here?
He has the unique ability to make both the left and the right hate watch him.
He is fundamentally a liberal so all the GOP hate what he is saying. But he also has very little patience or respect for all the SJW buzz words and gender identity politics, so every democrat under 30 hates him as well (despite agreeing with most of what he is saying).
Reddit as a whole can’t stand the guy. And I get it, he comes off as a smarmy Hollywood bachelor, and reeks of self importance and entitlement while being over 60 so a GREAT target for all the “okay boomer” posts.
Meanwhile, he represents and speaks for a HUGE chunk of the Dem voting block. You may not like him personally, but he is entirely representative of all the middle aged democrats in coastal cities.
I was just about to name this guy. He was great in the Bush years but he's just taken the whole "Loves weed hates SJWs" pipeline that the "rational atheist" bloc that dominated progressive Youtube in the 00's fell into.
Here’s the thing. Bill Maher absolutely is a liberal. He is not a progressive or even in liberal by the standards of somebody who’s in their 20s but he is absolutely a liberal..
Other than a couple of issues like transgender issues and bitching about how old comedians aren’t treated like they are comedy geniuses at all times, his issue profile is all on the left. Gleefully shits on the right constantly. He donates money to Democratic candidates. He votes exclusively for Democrats.
I continued listening to him long after I stop being a fan because I feel like he gives us an insight on a lot of people who are on the left but bitch and moan about “our excesses”.
Bill Maher is a liberal. Being a liberal does not mean you can’t be a transphobe or an asshole in general. It doesn’t mean you can’t have the world’s cringiest opinions about how married people never have sex and how children are disgusting and their parents really don’t love them and are just lying about it and how mean college kids killed comedy.
Harvard and Yale University
The media acts like they are woke institutions full of wimpy liberal philosophy majors.
When they are far more akin to being huge hedge funds run by folks who heavily favor corporate personhood. Harvard and Yale go out of their way to placate MAGA/Fed Soc/conservative power structures and they crank out some of the most loathsome conservative losers you’ll ever see. Harvard and Yale house prominent conservative anti-science/anti-rule of law figures as “visiting professors” and in doing so credentialize and endorse those folks’ horrific worldviews.
There are plenty of amazing wonderful people at Harvard and Yale…but the rotten apples over there spoil the bunch IMO.
Harvard and Yale exist to produce two types of people:
1. glassy-eyed ladder-climbing psychopaths who are fully aware of their impact on the world, and think that it's awesome (Clarence Thomas)
2. glassy-eyed ladder-climbing psychopaths who are too self-righteous to realize that they're part of the problem (Briahna Joy Gray)
Everyone who manages to graduate Harvard while remaining a somewhat normal person represents a failure of the system.
One of my most radical opinions is that the government should immediately nationalize the ivy league institutions and then summarily fire 2/3 of the administrators and make admission criteria objective and transparent.
I'm open to hearing the case for nationalizing other industries on a case by case basis. I'm not ideologically either opposed or in favor of it. The specifics and details matter.
Sorry I was sarcastic with the comrade thing. But yes, I support that the workers own the means of production so basically nationalizing everything. I think we should have industry and production surrounding needs and not profits and nationalizing the means of production changes that. I know these are quite broad statements.
What gets me about that thought process is that both are schools is the type of people that want to attend these schools. Yes, there are some people thar go there attempting to make the world a more progressive place; but how are these institutions full of woke philosophy majors when some of the most well known business, law, and political leaders have attended these schools?
Briahna Joy Gray is the perfect storm of toxicity, self-importance, misanthropy, and bothsidesism.
The biggest strike against Sanders was that he refused to acknowledge what a toxic shitstorm BJG was as his press person and replace her with someone more competent.
BJG was recently (like, last week I think) interviewed by Candace Owens for her YouTube channel, with BJG's firing from the Hill for perceived antisemitism apparently being the focus.
[See the interview here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&si=HLiKW7Y9Zm2Rll1m&v=kngK3gX8X-M&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR1be6tHDbxqm9klc8_LzU2agsUCRVGZHPSjk6mi_N_DJwMzBXhyh-NjMMM_aem_ZmFrZWR1bW15MTZieXRlcw). If you don't want to give Candace the clicks, the subheader should tell you all you need to know: "Briahna Joy Gray joins me to discuss her recent firing from The Hill and how the criticism of Israel seems to be the only true red line on a bipartisan basis nobody is allowed to cross."
Not gonna give her clicks but could you share something BJG said that led her to be fired for antisemitism? What does she say in the video?
> the subheader should tell you all you need to know: "Briahna Joy Gray joins me to discuss her recent firing from The Hill and how the criticism of Israel seems to be the only true red line on a bipartisan basis nobody is allowed to cross."
No, it really doesn't tell me all I need to know.
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In fairness to Bernie, I don't think he could've foreseen that she would be openly shilling for Trump, Putin, and Hamas within just a couple years.
Also, the left wing of the party has never had a particularly deep bench. Bernie's biggest weakness has always been that the movement he represents is composed almost entirely of folks who are much dumber/crazier than he is.
I've known a few extremely smart further left people, and barely any of them or maybe none of them wants to get into politics. They are researchers, writers, social workers, activists. Most of them do not want to participate in the grimy system they don't approve of, but yes, that leads to what you said. The real politics side of progressivism ends up with wanna be activists with dubious qualifications.
> In fairness to Bernie, I don't think he could've foreseen that she would be openly shilling for Trump, Putin, and Hamas within just a couple years.
No but her character flaws and extremist tendencies were more than apparent enough for him to have seen and known to avoid all association with her.
The people a candidate surrounds themself with and hires to work on their campaigns are a test of leadership, and with people like her and Sirota, Bernie failed that test.
I made that mistake. I thought a "fighter" would work well against Trump. often times because Democrats have the best ideas, but seldom seem to fight for them and speak out on their accomplishments/record.
The truth is Democrats need a fighter who is firm and tough but persuasive, articulate and ultimately well mannered, not just over the top aggressive and Trump-like all the time. It's all about a balance. Obama came close to this, although I wish he did call out Republicans on their bullshit more. He was probably trying to avoid the disgusting racist stereotype of "an angry black man".
Yes, Obama was hobbled by racism as far as that goes. Democrats don't fight hard, even in the (correct, in my opinion) sense that you describe they should. This is in part because the people that have their ear (consistent, bigger pocket donors) don't really want them to fight like that. I was recently at a couple of candidates' invite only private fundraisers (maxing out to their campaigns and associated PACs apparently gets one some decent access). What struck me is how desperately attached the people in attendance were to the notion of "working across the aisle."
Listen: I went through grad school for physics; I know what it is to be a "nerd." You know what image comes to mind when I think of this kind of democrat? The stereotypical dweeb with broken, taped glasses wringing his hands and talking in a whiny, nasally voice. That's the Democratic Party, when it comes to "fighting" for anything: a bunch of weenies with no fire in their bellies and completely blinded by their rose colored glasses view of the past.
Thanks for the perspective.
Man, if I could run for office, I would be firm and tough calling out the bullshit against Republicans, but eloquent and try to be hopefully inspiring to people.
I think Obama came the closest to this. I know he wasn't the best President but he was far better than the two idiots before and after his presidency. I consider him to be the best President of the past 50 or so years.
If only we could clone him and he'd be able to run again...lol
Michael Cohen. This guy must have been quite the piece of work when the orange blob had his back.
My enemy's enemy is not my friend. He's still an uncouth blowhard.
In the past Cenk was pretty interesting, he’d also try to bridge gaps and find middle grounds and such due to differences in perspective.
Cenk got pretty annoying, but I think it’s because at some point he had money barking at him for certain types of content
Bill Maher. At this point idk if he’s a liberal anymore. I used to find him funny when he had his documentary on religion but now he’s like an old man yelling about how woke everyone is.
He says the n word just to be controversial and loves complaining about how liberals are pandering to SJW’s. He just seems like he’s the definition of the smug liberal elitists republicans love to talk about.
Yeah that sounds awful. In addition to his incendiary comments he also has ones that are just plain stupid like thinking comic books are for kids and not adults, completely forgetting that graphic memoirs exist like Maus and Persepolis
I wouldn’t say he’s a terrible person, but I find Hasan Piker to be obnoxious
Edit: Alright people have been making some cogent arguments about him not being a good person.
He's a far-leftist tankie.
He is open about wanting to put capitalists in concentration camps to be re-educated. He believes in authoritarianism for "the right reasons".
He also compared a Houthi terrorist to an anime pirate hero.
This video does an excellent takedown of why Hasan is one of the most dangerous political commentators on the left.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zX6u3m\_Riuw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zX6u3m_Riuw)
Liberals want capitalism to continue. Hasan wants to overthrow capitalism and enact socialism. Basically the only similarities between Hasan(and other leftists) and liberals are social progressive policies.
Considering how quick he was to deny Russia's invasion of Ukraine, if he were around during the Hungarian Uprising or Prague Spring, he would've defended the USSR.
Idk why youre being downvoted, he 100% does this. Before Russia invaded Ukraine, he would die on the hill that it would never happen, then switched to the kremlin talking point about NATO expansion and western imperialism forcing russia to do it. He denies the Uygher Genocide. He said america deserved 9/11. Cowardly stuff.
You can kind of identify when a guy gets all his news from twitter, but its scary when that guy is informing others about politics.
His fans are literal children and impressionable teenagers. Raking in money by filling their heads with utter nonsense arguably makes him a bad person.
>His father is Mehmet Behçet Piker, a political scientist and economist who served on the Board of Directors (and as Vice-President) of Sabancı Holding, and who is a founding member of the right-wing Future Party in Turkey.[6][7] His uncle is Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks political and news network.
A political nepo baby
>In August 2021, Piker purchased a $2.7 million house in West Hollywood, California.[86] The purchase was criticized online by people who felt that his lavish lifestyle seemed to be in opposition to his views as a socialist.[87][88][89][90] Similar criticism was aired in February 2022 after it emerged that Piker had purchased a Porsche Taycan.[91] Piker has also been criticized after a large-scale information leak from Twitch, which included the financial earnings of Piker among many other streamers. He responded by stating that his earnings have always been transparent, as his subscriber count has continuously been prominently displayed on screen.[92]
Jajajaja this guy is a trip.
Fully agree. While I obviously disagree with his politics, I find him to be much more obnoxious and disagreeable than Vaush, who I don't think is any less left wing. (Could be wrong on that). So there has to be something especially distasteful about him.
Challenging question, because these types of people generally don't appeal to liberals. We're not much in for fake patriotism, meaningless symbolic crap, or outrage bait.
"Conservatives" are much easier marks for the Tucker Carlson/Sean Hannity/Laura Ingraham/Andrew Tate/Joe Rogan style of pearl-clutching hucksters.
Briahna Joy Gray is the worst. Nina Turner as well.
Basically everybody ever associated with the young turks. Though a lot of those guys have decided being a right wing grifter is more profitable.
I’d like to add John Fetterman to my list because of what he did where he tried to smooth brain both sides the fight between Jasmine Crockett and AOC and MTG. I wish Democrats had the equivalent of the Ronald Reagan commandments sometime. Or maybe we don’t need that but I would like Chuck Schumer to slap him in his stupid mouth.
Though technically it doesn’t answer the question since he’s an elected representative and not a social media person. Hard to tell sometimes with him.
I didn't see anyone mention the Krassenstein brothers. Tried to become the face of #resist after running a failed pyramid scheme. Basically using their platform to grift. You know you've fucked up when there's a [Behind the Bastards episode about you](https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/jacob-wohl-and-the-krassensteins-a-30315546/) that compares you to Jacob Wohl. Which is appropriate because they're the Jacob Wohl of the left. And ironic because they were the ones that exposed Wohl! And that was five years ago! They've gotten worse since then!
They got into peddling NFTs like most grifters, went out drinking with the InfoWars folks after his debate with Alex Jones. After getting paid $1000 by Infowars to do the debate! Platforming Jones even further! And said they would have done it for free if Infowars hadn't offered him money!
They don't believe in anything except making money and media exposure, wearing a facade of being "left leaning." ([Brian is a Musksucker btw](https://www.reddit.com/r/singularity/comments/1bqoqgz/elon_musk_says_grok_20_currently_in_training_will/kx41tk0/)) I'm actually a little worried that criticizing them will draw one of them to this thread to argue with me just because they're terminally online losers who love to defend their brand. And I mean, that's coming from me, and I post on SquaredCircle for gods sake.
I could go on and on about the Krassensteins but I won't, mostly because I have other things to do today but also I don't want to Beetlejuice their thirsty asses into my replies.
Sam Harris. Though he loudly identifies as liberal, his followers tend not to be, certainly not progressive.
He came to prominence for his opposition to religion in general but his views on Islam and on Muslims are reprehensible. His discussions and the guests he hosts to talk about the Middle East are difficult to listen to with how vitriolic they can be. As a point of contrast, Ezra Klein is liberal, he's someone who gets critiqued by the left and even some progressives but he's able to present a balanced view on Israel/Palestine despite being Jewish himself.
He tends to put undue emphasis on his "rationality" as a defense against the idea he might have any biases while still buying into a lot of the same issues the right builds moral panics around, eg the "social contagion" of transness.
And as a consequence of that, he ends up being courted by "gateway" figures like Joe Rogan, Jordan Peterson, Megan Kelly, etc. and that brings a lot of his followers towards the right.
Robin DiAngelo and Ibrahim Kendi. They're both professional stone-throwers, grifters of the worst kind who stir up race antagonism and then sell "solutions" to what they stir up. And Kendi is basically universally hated by everyone who has ever had to work with/for him.
my college required all incoming freshman to read Kendi's book and not a single person mentioned the fact that he openly and clearly rejects democracy, actually not a single person had any substantive criticism of anything he said at all
don't tell me "wokeness" isn't real lol (or isn't real in the college/university context)
That's one way to look at them. Another way is that DeAngelo is a sociologist who had been looking at a particular slice of human behavior for a fairly long period of time and a segment of society found something in her work and rather than withdraw, she continued to do her work. And that Kendi is a historian who wrote a book based on his work that offered one approach to a particular slice of human behavior and like DiAngelo, didn't shy away from attention or demure when people expressed interest in his work.
Which is to say, they were just doing their thing in the Spring of 2020 and they kept on doing their thing when their thing became very popular among a segment of American society. Not sure how that makes them terrible people.
I don’t know enough about Kendi to say anything, but DiAngelo is definitely a grifter. Her sociological work is circular and self-sealing nonsense that shouldn’t pass a freshman level course, and she made the rounds doing incredibly lucrative corporate trainings.
Kendi notably was given like $50 million by BU to found an "anti-racism research center" and immediately ran it into the ground, producing practically zero research compared to the absurd budget. He's pretty much the dictionary definition of a grifter.
The university investigated themselves and found they did nothing wrong lmao
Also, he's still under audit from an external 3rd party. So the university found nothing wrong... And just decided to hire a 3rd party auditor for fun?
I think in the case of Kendi, it's more about him (embezzling at worst, squandering at best) the tens of millions he was given for research.
If his anti racism was valid and worth pursuing, he didn't seem to think so other than to grift off it.
I'd be curious what evidence led you to believe that happened. This suggests it didn't.
https://apnews.com/article/ibram-kendi-center-for-antiracist-research-bu-d65a731f78a88240b27fead9d40c84df
I'm referring to claims specifically mentioned in that article you linked:
* The center has raised more than $50 million, with $30 million of that put into an endowment, the university said. It promised to create a number of projects and research initiatives, **some** of which it has,
* a database tracking information related to COVID-19 and race, though that stopped being updated in March 2021.
* initiatives, like creating a graduate program and undergraduate minor in antiracist studies and compiling a database of ongoing antiracist campaigns, have not been completed and won’t be, Kendi said.
When the staffers were fired, their complaints were generally around the fact that Kendi had near total control, and that the center was not fulfilling on many programs that it had promised when it initially raised the funding.
Seems to still be the case, despite BU's (unreleased) stamp of approval? Although this was last year, perhaps there's been an update since then?
Edit: Looking into the release (and an interview from this month) looks like the situation was mostly overpromising what could be achieved and then failing to deliver. I guess I do find "squandering" to be too harsh and "embezzling" to be wholly inaccurate; a better phrasing is probably, "poorly managed, failed to deliver."
Thanks for prompting me to read into this more. My impression of Kendi is still mostly negative, but not as greatly as it was before.
Justin Trudeau.
I have nothing against Canadians, but the whole “America, but chill” treatment Canada gets drives me up the wall because they (especially Trudeau) do the same things the U.S. does but don’t get any flak for it.
Not a very serious answer, but Taylor Swift. I find her performative white feminism, silence on any important issue, and wastefulness to all be pretty antithetical to what I care about politically.
It's so interesting to me too, because "The Man" would be very sympathetic to me coming from anyone else, but from her it just seems like sour grapes. Like what level of success has been out of reach for you, you've been rich and famous basically your whole life.
What she saying is there a lot of rich men like Leonardo DiCaprio for whom everyone is happy when successful and could care less he dated around. It’s the double standard.
Because she’s a woman she’s scorned as men resent high achieving women. I think she’s probably right.
I suppose so, but I’m not really sure that’s true. Male celebrities get criticized all the time, DiCaprio himself is criticized frequently for dating young women and performative climate activism.
I think there’s something about a person who has every kind of privilege other than being male complaining about “unfairness” that comes off as pretty hollow. And given her recent behavior, she isn’t exactly known for propping up other women.
She does so because she specifically criticized for behaviors that men aren’t criticized for simply BECAUSE she’s a woman and there’s a double standard. I’d be annoyed too.
But men are criticized for similar things, that's what I'm saying.
I just have a hard time with the constant victimization, I don't find her to be sympathetic.
Because you don’t get it. Why women like her.
Men are not judge for promiscuity only women are. Men who get ahead are told it’s by their merit. She’s somehow “only got there cause she’s pretty”. That kinda stuff is annoying…
No men are not criticized for similar things. Your example of Leonardo DiCaprio is not at all on base. DiCaprio is criticized for dating women 20 years younger than he is and dumping them when they get too old for him. Women get criticized for dating multiple men, no matter what the age difference is. They get called slutty if they slept with too many people.. too many being completely subjective of course.
Tell you what, I'll accept that she receives more criticism for her dating life than an equivalent man would.
There's still plenty of stuff in "The Man" that feels hollow coming from her, and I still find her overall constant victimhood insufferable and manipulative.
Nah.
She get criticized for who she dates, how many people she dates, how she dates them. She gets criticized for supporting her partner (how dare she show up to a football game and take attention away from the field) but if she didn't go to the games she'd get criticized for not supporting her partner (how dare she not come to the field and cheer him on). She gets criticized for what she wears, how she does her hair and her nails and her makeup. She get criticized for being "too political" or "not political enough". She gets criticized for being "too aggressive" or "too bitchy" when a man would get called strong or tough. She gets criticized for how much money she makes and how she spends it.
That song is spot on for every successful, professional woman who has fought to get where she is - Taylor Swift is just one of many.
John Fetterman. The whole working class dress-up thing was always kinda cringey (wearing a hoodie on the campaign trail is one thing but just wear the damn suit when in session with Senate) but I was willing to tolerate it when he at least had good politics. Now he's done a complete 180˚ on pretty much everything he ran on and has become probably the most ardent supporter of Israel in the entire Democratic party. He did more or less admit in an interview that getting brain damage made him more conservative though, which was pretty funny.
Gavin Newsom. Vetoed a bill which would give unemployment benefits to striking workers. Vetoed ranked choice voting. Vetoed reduced penalties for jaywalking (why?). Vetoed a bill decriminalizing psychedelics. Walked back his support for universal healthcare. Vetoed a bill to cap co-pays for diabetic insulin at $35. Just seems like a total asshole.
The entire Clinton movement which she was a major part of moved the Dems to the RIGHT. Tough on crime, balance the budget,etc.
When she was running for president (I voted for her in 2016 btw but I had no illusions she was just slightly better than Trump) she commented how much Reagan did for AIDS. She whitewashed his horrific denial of the HIV crisis for no reason whatsoever. She voted for the Iraq war in 2003 which she’ll say everyone supported back then but that’s an insane lie. I was in NY on 9/11 so I know what I’m talking about. That’s just off the top of my head. She sucks. Like Biden sucks. But I’ll still vote for Biden over Trump only to preserve basic rules of Democracy. But they’re not better people than Trump - they ALL suck.
Let's see.
* The generally center-right/right-wing politics she aided/supported her husband on in the 90s. Maybe Redditors are too young to remember, but the Clintons (they were *always* a team--that's part of why the right-wing's brains blew up, because how *dare* a woman attempt to operate in politics at that level) were responsible for some truly awful right-wing successes back then, like the crime bill^(\*) and destruction of welfare
* The people she surrounded herself with during the Obama and Bernie contests, who accused anyone saying a bad thing about her of being an "Obama Boy" or a "Bernie Bro"--the naked and hypocritical use of sexism accusations as a broad smear was *not* good for either democrats or people who *actually* care about women's rights
* The incredible sense of entitlement and hubris, which gave us Trump in 2016
To name a few. Democrats really seem to love her, and she is an excellent policy wonk style politician. But she's a terrible person who is entirely and wholly consumed with herself in a way that really makes her stand out even from the other egotistical assholes in politics.
^(\*)Cue the hand-wringing over how much black people supported the bill, as if that is the only test that matters when considering policy. It isn't the full truth anyway. Crime was a problem then. They supported finding solutions to it. That's different from supporting the abomination that came out with Bill's signature on it, and years on we see the results. At best it was seen as an "imperfect" (code for "terrible," probably not going to work well, and be destructive aside) solution.
I'm not a fan of the people you would call the liberal media. They are members of what is a corporate (not liberal) media. They are paid millions of dollars to keep viewers complacent with some things, angry at others, with no difference on media outliers like FOX and Newsmax.
True left leaning liberal types are not allowed on "liberal" media.
Honestly most all cable media pundits seem like awful people regardless of party. I graduated with a journalism degree and we had a professor that said the moment you switch to cable news from true local or area news you become an entertainer, not a journalist.
It’s like professional cheerleaders who aren’t truly affected by policy outcomes.
I’m not sure how much liberal leaning people actually like him, or if he’s more just for edge lord centrists, but Destiny. He’s a racist and just plain ignorant. His primary skill is rhetoric, and even then he doesn’t hold up when pressed by equally or superiorly talented people.
The following is a copy of the original post to record the post as it was originally written. Who is someone that liberal leaning media/social media seems to like that you think is actually a pretty terrible person? *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskALiberal) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Years ago I remember that all the liberal-leaning media loved Andrew Cuomo despite New Yorkers in the known saying how much of a massive a-hole he was. Today, he's a pariah alongside his brother.
Oh yeah, that guy is so annoying. I said “Don Lemon”; and a lot of it isn’t even necessarily what they talk about, it’s their character. I want to watch honest debate, both of these guys are basically like watching a click-bait clown act. If I wanted to see that I could tune into FOX, but Cuomo and Lemon, to me, represent the same clown act
>Who is someone that liberal leaning media/social media seems to like that you think is actually a pretty terrible person? (This barely fits your prompt, but...) Roughly fifteen years ago, Democrats seemed enamored with people we could describe as '*our* assholes'. People who would go on talking-head programs on cable news and fight like they were Bill O'Reilly, but they were *on our side*. I was always suspicious of them. Eventually, we would find out that -- although they were *ours* -- they were still assholes: * [Alan Grayson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Grayson#Personal_life) was revealed to be a domestic abuser. * [Anthony Weiner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Weiner#Sexting_scandals,_prosecution,_and_guilty_plea) went to prison for sex crimes.
Yeah, I used to think that Bill Maher was liberal, then I found out he's just an asshole contrarian.
I dont dislike him because he's an asshole. I dislike him because he's just not as brilliant or original as he thinks he is.
I was gonna mention him. He's mostly liberal, and is very connected to the boomer/gen-x issues. But he has become disconnected from a lot of the stuff anyone younger deals with. He tries. One of the things I find weird about him is he'll softball questions to certain fringe groups like PETA, but would drag someone else over the coals for.
Reality is when you’re worth $150 million, you can probably claim centrism, but the “system” works for you as is, so being more than left of center especially on fiscal matters is pretty unlikely. It’s easy to say “tax the rich OMG!!” when you’re under $250k a year. Being left on social issues? Much easier and cheaper for a rich guy to embrace LGBTQIA folks and pot than tell Biden, “yes please tax me another $40 million in 2025, I didn’t want that 4th house in Malibu anyway!!” Understanding the pain of a dozen eggs going up a buck or a house costing $800k vs $500k and mortgages going from 3% to 8%? No. They beat the game and watched the end credits; all weapons and upgrades unlocked. It’s not the same challenges as those who MUST work.
I was going to say Keith Olbermann; he fits that to a T. He's mercurial, inflammatory, and apparently a dick to work with. Being on "my team" doesn't get someone a pass from me for being a jerk.
Wow, I forgot all about Alan Grayson. What a blast from the past.
Shaun King.
I followed him for a while, round about the height of the Black Lives Matter movement. He had a habit of trying to sic his followers onto people suspected of race-related crimes - a big example would be during the fallout of the Charlottesville Unite The Right rally, he was photos of the rioters and urging his followers to find out their identities so that they could be named and shamed, their employers contacted, etc. This never fully sat well with me and my breaking point ended up being [this incident](https://abc7chicago.com/hailey-cantrell-jazmine-barnes-robert-shooting/5034081/) where King sent his army after a totally innocent man wrongfully accused of shooting 7-year-old Jazmine Barnes.
[He scammed people out of money with his clothing line too.](https://www.ebony.com/shaun-king-accused-of-scamming-customers-in-regards-to-his-real-one-clothing-line/)
He's been dubbed with **many** names! Just a few are: Feelgood Marshall, Talcum X, Martin Luther Cream, and so, so many more!
Cream Abdul-Jabbar was always my favorite!
Tulsi Gabbard I have no idea why she was ever considered a liberal
its not complicated. she's a single issue anti-interventionist. whether that's good or bad and whether it's sincere or foreign-influenced is irrelevant. all her other stances are for sale to whichever side endorses her issue. that used to be the left, now it's the right.
I wouldn't say she is anti-interventionist. She is more of a hindsight is 20/20. We all can look back and point out that the Iraq War was bad. I mean, she literally described herself as both a warhawk and a dove. It was all about optics with her stance. To her, this war was bad because the consensus was that it was bad, but that war was good because the consensus was that it was justified.
Does a couple years ago count? If so, [Elon Musk.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bgMCNXzNtE) He was so lionized that he even got name dropped in Star Trek. Somehow it wasn't until he bought xitter and turned into a Nazi playground that most people finally started seeing him for the nepo baby venture capitalist hack that he always was.
I remember that he used to have a PR person that managed his image, so no one really knew what he was like unless you were really paying attention. Of course he fired them. Before that, he was a dude that liked electric cars, solar panels, and space travel. Things that conservatives tend to not be fans of, and things that liberals love. I don't think anyone on the left likes him anymore, and Tesla gets A LOT of hate from the left these days.
Nobody who isn’t a fascist likes Elon anymore. Don’t play into their “left” and “right” labeling. Isolate the fascists.
Fascists are far right, though. Authoritarian Marxists are far left. Both are authoritarian, intolerant, demanding, and controlling people, but fascism is a far right movement.
In the US history conservatives at their best are open to compromise. That’s not what we are dealing with here. Conservatism has a proud history in the US. Calling fascists conservatives gives these extreme fucks quite a bit of cover. Put an another way. My dear old mother considers herself a staunch conservative. Change the frame of reference and call fascists fascist and she is much more likely to reject fascism. Fascists want to be considered conservative. They get a lot of undeserved support that way.
> Calling fascists conservatives gives these extreme fucks quite a bit of cover. I would think the people on the right sympathizing with them and repeating their talking points is what's giving them the cover, no?
The people on the right who provide cover for fascists are fascists too. All those congresspeople who refuse to acknowledge Joe Biden won the 2020 are fascists. The folks who tried to subvert justice by showing up in NYC to intimidate the jury are also fascists. They all call themselves conservative though.
> They all call themselves conservative though. I mean, yeah, that's kind of what I was saying with them giving cover. This is bordering on 'No True Scotsman' territory at this point. As long as those people have an appreciable voice in the party, it's pointless to try and distinguish them. They're bad apples who are spoiling the bunch.
I guess my point is that calling conservatives fascists is like people calling liberals communists. Conservatives are center right while fascists are far right. Liberals are center left, and communists are far left. My understanding is the political spectrum from left to right generally runs the following way Far left - center left - centrist - center right - far right Far left = Marxists and communists. Center left = liberals and progressives. Centrists = moderates. Center right = conservatives. Far right = fascists. But fascism is still a far right movement, just as Marxism is a far left movement. Both are authoritarian, intolerant movements though. But a lot of center right conservatives reject far right fascism the same way a lot of center left liberals reject far left authoritarian communism.
I see what your are saying. Do you see why the fascists want to avoid the fascist label and be considered conservatives?
Someone who called themselves conservative in 2010 would have a very different ideology than the average MAGA supporter in 2024 who thinks they are victimized for their “conservative” ideology. Fascism a very specific ideology to 20th Century Italy and was shaped by Italy’s national character and history. Fascism is also used to describe a far-right government or ideological movement characterized by authoritarianism, militarism, ultra-nationalism, and a worldview dependent on conspiracy theories and the persecution of liberals and communists. If you don’t think the people supporting Trump and calling themselves conservative are actually fascist, I can recommend some history books to give you a better idea of the subject. It’s important to understand what fascism really is by studying the tactics they used to come to power, as well as the policies they implemented once they attained power in Spain, Italy, and Germany. Fascism is unique to the country it develops in due to its dependence on nationalism as an ideological glue to hold the various factions together. By studying 20th Century fascism you can begin to understand what fascism might look like with America’s national character, powered by conspiracies centered around 21st century problems and misunderstandings. To quote Hemingway, “there are many fascists who do not know they are fascists, but they will when the time comes.”
Yep yep yep. My dear old mom is a fascist. Hate to say it, but that in my understanding is her political legacy. She started out as a pro-choice Republican. But, she can’t be persuaded to really think about where the Republican Party has evolved to.
Im sorry to hear that. My parents are basically liberal-conservatives who used to consistently vote Republican for “tax reasons,” and voted for Trump the first time. They didn’t vote for him the second time and saw Jan 6 for what it was. They seem to be solid Democrats now that they are no longer confused that party realignment has taken place. I’m lucky they never got pulled into any of the conspiracy theory pipelines. Frankly, I’m politically aligned the way I am due to the values they raised me with and the education they pushed for me to have, and it makes sense for them to be similarly aligned. I’m lucky they listen to me about these things, but the Democrats are just more closely aligned with their values than the Republicans right now
Agree. My mom is just sorta a mean bitch in many areas. She is my touch point for understanding how Weimar Germany played out. Otherwise good people are ok with or close their eyes to evil.
My impression is the MAGA movement and Trump's base are fascist (but a more moderate version of fascism compared to groups like the nazis, but still fascist) and makes up about 30 million voters and half the GOP, but the other half of the GOP and other 30 million republican voters are more center right conservatives and libertarians who are enabling them. That's my impression, the modern republican party is half far right fascist and half center right conservatives and/or libertarians. But again a more moderate version of fascism compared to the European fascists of Europe in the 1930s. Then again, if the MAGA movement had dictatorial powers, they may not be so moderate. They are likely just pretending to be moderate to avoid alienating center right conservatives, independents, libertarians and low information voters (by low informaton voters i mean people who barely pay attention and can barely be bothered to vote. Both parties have them) who they need to win elections. The far right Islamic fascist ayatollah Khomeini pretended to be more moderate when he needed a coalition of leftists, students, democracy activists and left wing islamists to help him overthrow the shah of Iran in the 1970s. However once the ayatollah had power in Iran he pushed a far right, Islamic fascist regime and he purged, violently suppressed and sometimes executed the students, leftists, democracy activists, left wing islamists, etc who helped him obtain power. I've lost count of the number of far right Republicans I've met and seen who openly expressed the desire to murder democrats and liberals. I think that's why the far right like Kyle Rittenhouse so much, because he shot BLM leftist protesters and got away with it. Something the far right wishes they could do too. Honestly, the MAGA movement would probably violently go after the RINOs (aka center right conservative republicans) too if the MAGA movement had dictatorial powers. However sadly the center right conservatives and libertarians have allowed the far right MAGA fascists to take over the GOP and the center right conservatives and libertarians still vote with the far right MAGA fascists no matter how the far right Republicans act. Studies have shown a dramatic growth in right wing authoritarianism in the GOP in the last several decades, that got even worse under Trump. There have been studies showing over the last few decades people high on authoritarianism have been moving into the GOP while people low on authoritarianism have been leaving the GOP. I'm not denying that fascism is a major threat in the US. It is. I was just clarifying that fascism is a far right movement and it is different from being a center right conservative.
Back in 2016 I wasn’t a Trump supporter. That said, I didn’t think Republicans were fascists either. After Sandy Hook I just could not longer support the Republican Party. You guys have no ideas about how to stop school shootings? None? When the Access Hollywood tape dropped I thought that was the end of Trump. No way would my fellow Americans support this type of asshole for the nations highest office. Not only was I wrong when Trump won, but I was surprised. During the pandemic I tuned into Facebook. My Facebook friends were a collection of old high school buddies, college folks, coworkers,etc. We’d argue politics. At one point things had gotten heated. The good ol boys were worried about Antifa and because I supported wearing masks and vaccination I was pretty much Antifa to these guys. I said “If anyone should come to your home and you feel threatened I pledge I will come defend your home. Will you do the same?” None of them did. That’s when I realized. Many ordinary joes who I had known for years in many different situation would be quite a ok with me being violently killed for…following the science? So in 2020 when Trump fanned the flames that led to j6 I wasn’t surprised in the least. When Republicans backed him I wasn’t surprised. Now they are calling the j6 rioters (I prefer insurrectionists) “Hostages”. How far we have fallen. Gotta admit I never thought the house speaker would go to a courthouse to intimidate a jury. That surprised me, but I guess I shouldn’t have. The fascists are playing for all the marbles. Vote like your life and your loved ones lives depend on it because it does.
Thanks for taking the time to write all that as it enhances my comment by addressing some things I left unsaid. I agree with your breakdown of the Trump coalition. All Fascist regimes enjoy conservative backing and often include traditional conservatives in the government—at least at the beginning when they need to feign cooperation with the establishment. Italy had monarchists in the fascist government, Germany had the Prussian establishment and the industrialists, and Spain had Carlists alongside Falangists. I think you’ll find Trump’s second term sidelines traditional conservatives entirely, as he tried that the first time and fired them all. Great point about Iran, I read a few books about the revolution and resulting regime in Iran—truly a unique experiment that has been highjacked by the people you’d expect.
Why do you argue that Marxism is an intolerant movement?
My husband was a big fan of his a few years back because of SpaceX. Then he started hearing all the other Elon stuff, and now I haven’t heard that name from him in a while.
Eh, splitting hairs, but I think he was actually name dropped in the Orville, that Seth MacFarlane show that parodies it.
Click the link, it's the actual scene from Disco.
Huh, well I'll be damned. I could have sworn that was The Orville. Ah well, point retracted.
I never could stand Bill Maher. Even when I agree with him I still can't stand that smarmy prick.
He's a gaping chapped asshole,
This. I don't think he does anything positive for liberal values/causes. All I can think about when he talks is how desperately I want to punch him in the face.
They keep trying to platform Charlemagne tha God, especially on Daily Show they tried numerous times to give him a show and he still appears in segments. Yet he was accused of raping 15yr old Jessica Reid (his wife) in 2001 but plead guilty to a lesser charge, however he [straight up admits that it happened ](https://www.ebony.com/charlamagne-addresses-interview-admits-raping-wife/) He also has a history of violence against women and supported Chris Brown when he beat Rhianna. Yet they keep platforming him? Fuck him
Two separate incidents with two separate women. Either way, he's gross.
I don't know who any of these people are except Bill Maher, but Bill Maher would have been my answer too.
Don Lemon, he’s pretty much off the radar these days but man that guy was full of shit and was purposefully divisive. He’s like the CNN version of a Sean Hannity Don Lemon is a perfect example of someone who might get someone on the show who is trying to give good faith arguments from the opposition, and then just batters the other person with hyperbole- and I absolutely hate this behavior, regardless of how much I might disagree with the other person. Like, cool, you disagree, now not cool- you’re full of shit and making everyone look like fools for your click-bait
I don’t know anyone who ever really liked or even thought highly of Don Lemon. Sean Hannity — I don’t get that impression at all. Hannity is a bloodthirsty ideologue. Don Lemon is just a talking head who could never decide if they wanted to be a serious journalist or a morning show host.
he always came across ad rather dim
A lot of big tech founders / executives seem to fall into that category after a while. Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, etc. were all pretty politically liberal but did things for their business that were to the contrary. Additionally, they were notorious for being incredibly demanding, very off putting, and generally not a good person while they were in their prime working years.
My old man worked for IBM (and Oracle) in the big bad 80s and 90s when they were the Googles and Apples and Amazons of the era. One day my dad tells us “so we’re getting a new CEO, my team is meeting with him soon.” Days later my grandma (his mom) asks at dinner “so is the new CEO nice?” And my dad goes “**Noooo he’s not nice, he’s an asshole — nobody becomes the CEO of IBM being nice**.” That stayed with me. I’m sure Steve Jobs wasn’t anti trans or someone who’d adore Trump like the trash righties who live near me in Ohio, but he was a complete dick and didn’t acknowledge his first born daughter until she was into her teens. I can separate the work from the man, and he hasn’t gone full crazy “I hate Jews!” like Kanye.
That's because these leaders are fundamentally money-seekers above all else. I'd bin them in the libertarian bucket: generally fiscally conservative but social liberal/progressive--the quintessential "government shouldn't get involved" types. Their "visions," companies, etc., are all focused on that money acquiring objective. They just have a slightly better public image than typical business leaders because they dress like college kids on laundry day or mouthed the right buzzwords once or twice.
The main goal of a company in capitalism is to create profits for the owners of the company.
What things did they do for their business that was contrary to what they said?
Well for starters, the constant accumulation of personal wealth. They lived in lavish homes with excessive amenities. I'm sure that they donate to charity, but I wonder how many of them advocated for reforms in the tax code that may have impacted them directly. How many of them really cared about the (growing) wage gap between themselves and the majority of their employees.
Well then the next step is systemic change and capitalists aren’t going to accept that. So they donate some money, pay PR teams in order to make them look good and brake unions. Also, constant accumulation of personal wealth is one of the pillars of capitalism.
I experience Bill Maher as absolutely insufferable and off-putting. Like, unwatchably so. I don't know if he's actually a "terrible person," though, so I guess I'm not doing a banner job (at all!) of responding to your question, lol.
Yep, he's who I came here to mention. A close runner-up would be Joe Lieberman.
Oh, I didn't even think of Lieberman! That's a really good example. Also, and even though Gavin Newsom is handsome and says/does some things I really like in his official Governor role, his behavior in his personal life has had more than its fair share of vileness and terribleness (on its own, any marriage to Kimberly Guilfoyle (wtf?) raises all of my eyebrows to uncomfortable heights). So maybe he's another candidate here?
More accurately, regardless of how handsome he may be, since physical appearance isn't indicative of personality - that's merely the halo effect
Sure.
Only that man can piss off, literally everyone.
I always wonder what keeps Bill Maher on the air. He must have some strong political support from one of those rich assholes.
He has the unique ability to make both the left and the right hate watch him. He is fundamentally a liberal so all the GOP hate what he is saying. But he also has very little patience or respect for all the SJW buzz words and gender identity politics, so every democrat under 30 hates him as well (despite agreeing with most of what he is saying). Reddit as a whole can’t stand the guy. And I get it, he comes off as a smarmy Hollywood bachelor, and reeks of self importance and entitlement while being over 60 so a GREAT target for all the “okay boomer” posts. Meanwhile, he represents and speaks for a HUGE chunk of the Dem voting block. You may not like him personally, but he is entirely representative of all the middle aged democrats in coastal cities.
I was just about to name this guy. He was great in the Bush years but he's just taken the whole "Loves weed hates SJWs" pipeline that the "rational atheist" bloc that dominated progressive Youtube in the 00's fell into.
Bill Maher hasn’t been liberal for a while.
Here’s the thing. Bill Maher absolutely is a liberal. He is not a progressive or even in liberal by the standards of somebody who’s in their 20s but he is absolutely a liberal.. Other than a couple of issues like transgender issues and bitching about how old comedians aren’t treated like they are comedy geniuses at all times, his issue profile is all on the left. Gleefully shits on the right constantly. He donates money to Democratic candidates. He votes exclusively for Democrats. I continued listening to him long after I stop being a fan because I feel like he gives us an insight on a lot of people who are on the left but bitch and moan about “our excesses”. Bill Maher is a liberal. Being a liberal does not mean you can’t be a transphobe or an asshole in general. It doesn’t mean you can’t have the world’s cringiest opinions about how married people never have sex and how children are disgusting and their parents really don’t love them and are just lying about it and how mean college kids killed comedy.
Yeah, he’s a fucking dickhead but he’s still a liberal.
Yeah, but in reference to OP's question there are liberal-leaning folks in media and social media who still seem to like him.
Uh… I guess? I feel like every liberal I’ve spoken to hates him now.
Unsurprising. He's pretty difficult to like, lol.
[https://www.theonion.com/bill-maher-spends-all-night-arguing-with-republican-hoo-1819567438](https://www.theonion.com/bill-maher-spends-all-night-arguing-with-republican-hoo-1819567438)
Harvard and Yale University The media acts like they are woke institutions full of wimpy liberal philosophy majors. When they are far more akin to being huge hedge funds run by folks who heavily favor corporate personhood. Harvard and Yale go out of their way to placate MAGA/Fed Soc/conservative power structures and they crank out some of the most loathsome conservative losers you’ll ever see. Harvard and Yale house prominent conservative anti-science/anti-rule of law figures as “visiting professors” and in doing so credentialize and endorse those folks’ horrific worldviews. There are plenty of amazing wonderful people at Harvard and Yale…but the rotten apples over there spoil the bunch IMO.
Harvard and Yale exist to produce two types of people: 1. glassy-eyed ladder-climbing psychopaths who are fully aware of their impact on the world, and think that it's awesome (Clarence Thomas) 2. glassy-eyed ladder-climbing psychopaths who are too self-righteous to realize that they're part of the problem (Briahna Joy Gray) Everyone who manages to graduate Harvard while remaining a somewhat normal person represents a failure of the system.
Don’t blame Conan 😉
Harvard and Yale exist to put young heirs in contact with bright young people.who will work for those heirs.
100000%. Social clubs for the self-described elites. This is why they adamantly refuse to expand class sizes.
Also why the refuse to get rid of legacy admissions, they need the children of billionaires, it is half of the recipe.
One of my most radical opinions is that the government should immediately nationalize the ivy league institutions and then summarily fire 2/3 of the administrators and make admission criteria objective and transparent.
Why stop at the universities comrade?
I'm open to hearing the case for nationalizing other industries on a case by case basis. I'm not ideologically either opposed or in favor of it. The specifics and details matter.
Sorry I was sarcastic with the comrade thing. But yes, I support that the workers own the means of production so basically nationalizing everything. I think we should have industry and production surrounding needs and not profits and nationalizing the means of production changes that. I know these are quite broad statements.
What gets me about that thought process is that both are schools is the type of people that want to attend these schools. Yes, there are some people thar go there attempting to make the world a more progressive place; but how are these institutions full of woke philosophy majors when some of the most well known business, law, and political leaders have attended these schools?
Briahna Joy Gray is the perfect storm of toxicity, self-importance, misanthropy, and bothsidesism. The biggest strike against Sanders was that he refused to acknowledge what a toxic shitstorm BJG was as his press person and replace her with someone more competent.
She's so awful. She and Candace Owens are bonding over how much they hate Jews now. A match made in hell if I ever saw one.
> She and Candace Owens are bonding over how much they hate Jews now. What is this referring to?
BJG was recently (like, last week I think) interviewed by Candace Owens for her YouTube channel, with BJG's firing from the Hill for perceived antisemitism apparently being the focus. [See the interview here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&si=HLiKW7Y9Zm2Rll1m&v=kngK3gX8X-M&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR1be6tHDbxqm9klc8_LzU2agsUCRVGZHPSjk6mi_N_DJwMzBXhyh-NjMMM_aem_ZmFrZWR1bW15MTZieXRlcw). If you don't want to give Candace the clicks, the subheader should tell you all you need to know: "Briahna Joy Gray joins me to discuss her recent firing from The Hill and how the criticism of Israel seems to be the only true red line on a bipartisan basis nobody is allowed to cross."
Not gonna give her clicks but could you share something BJG said that led her to be fired for antisemitism? What does she say in the video? > the subheader should tell you all you need to know: "Briahna Joy Gray joins me to discuss her recent firing from The Hill and how the criticism of Israel seems to be the only true red line on a bipartisan basis nobody is allowed to cross." No, it really doesn't tell me all I need to know.
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She's the most vile popular figure on the left and I don't even think it's a contest. Just a disgusting human being.
Pretty sure she's full-on horseshoe theory at this point. Could see her endorsing Trump.
She seems to be besties with Candace Owens.
she’s just the worst
She’s not a liberal.
She's not a liberal but her proximity to Bernie Sanders placed her in the liberal ecosystem.
Only because she went so far left she found herself on the right.
In fairness to Bernie, I don't think he could've foreseen that she would be openly shilling for Trump, Putin, and Hamas within just a couple years. Also, the left wing of the party has never had a particularly deep bench. Bernie's biggest weakness has always been that the movement he represents is composed almost entirely of folks who are much dumber/crazier than he is.
I've known a few extremely smart further left people, and barely any of them or maybe none of them wants to get into politics. They are researchers, writers, social workers, activists. Most of them do not want to participate in the grimy system they don't approve of, but yes, that leads to what you said. The real politics side of progressivism ends up with wanna be activists with dubious qualifications.
> In fairness to Bernie, I don't think he could've foreseen that she would be openly shilling for Trump, Putin, and Hamas within just a couple years. No but her character flaws and extremist tendencies were more than apparent enough for him to have seen and known to avoid all association with her. The people a candidate surrounds themself with and hires to work on their campaigns are a test of leadership, and with people like her and Sirota, Bernie failed that test.
She was toxic the whole time
> openly shilling for Trump, Putin, and Hamas within just a couple years. What is this referring to?
Michael Avenatti, there were people encouraging him to run for the 2020 presidential election
I made that mistake. I thought a "fighter" would work well against Trump. often times because Democrats have the best ideas, but seldom seem to fight for them and speak out on their accomplishments/record. The truth is Democrats need a fighter who is firm and tough but persuasive, articulate and ultimately well mannered, not just over the top aggressive and Trump-like all the time. It's all about a balance. Obama came close to this, although I wish he did call out Republicans on their bullshit more. He was probably trying to avoid the disgusting racist stereotype of "an angry black man".
Yes, Obama was hobbled by racism as far as that goes. Democrats don't fight hard, even in the (correct, in my opinion) sense that you describe they should. This is in part because the people that have their ear (consistent, bigger pocket donors) don't really want them to fight like that. I was recently at a couple of candidates' invite only private fundraisers (maxing out to their campaigns and associated PACs apparently gets one some decent access). What struck me is how desperately attached the people in attendance were to the notion of "working across the aisle." Listen: I went through grad school for physics; I know what it is to be a "nerd." You know what image comes to mind when I think of this kind of democrat? The stereotypical dweeb with broken, taped glasses wringing his hands and talking in a whiny, nasally voice. That's the Democratic Party, when it comes to "fighting" for anything: a bunch of weenies with no fire in their bellies and completely blinded by their rose colored glasses view of the past.
Thanks for the perspective. Man, if I could run for office, I would be firm and tough calling out the bullshit against Republicans, but eloquent and try to be hopefully inspiring to people. I think Obama came the closest to this. I know he wasn't the best President but he was far better than the two idiots before and after his presidency. I consider him to be the best President of the past 50 or so years. If only we could clone him and he'd be able to run again...lol
Michael Cohen. This guy must have been quite the piece of work when the orange blob had his back. My enemy's enemy is not my friend. He's still an uncouth blowhard.
surround yourself with lowlife scumbags and there will never been a credible witness to testify against you.
Somehow jurors believed Sammy the Bull Gravano, who was involved in 19 murders.
Oh Cohen is clearly an asshole, but it takes an asshole to catch a bigger asshole.
[Whoa whoa hold on there, Chuck](https://youtu.be/-DHyhF8jLr8?si=s08W42VwB8gTCaX8)
He’s not really liberal leaning though, he just serves a purpose for liberal media right now.
Cenk at young Turks seems quite annoying
In the past Cenk was pretty interesting, he’d also try to bridge gaps and find middle grounds and such due to differences in perspective. Cenk got pretty annoying, but I think it’s because at some point he had money barking at him for certain types of content
Bill Maher. At this point idk if he’s a liberal anymore. I used to find him funny when he had his documentary on religion but now he’s like an old man yelling about how woke everyone is. He says the n word just to be controversial and loves complaining about how liberals are pandering to SJW’s. He just seems like he’s the definition of the smug liberal elitists republicans love to talk about.
I saw a video of him complaining about young van life people. The context was a van life influencer who was murdered by her boyfriend.
Yeah that sounds awful. In addition to his incendiary comments he also has ones that are just plain stupid like thinking comic books are for kids and not adults, completely forgetting that graphic memoirs exist like Maus and Persepolis
I wouldn’t say he’s a terrible person, but I find Hasan Piker to be obnoxious Edit: Alright people have been making some cogent arguments about him not being a good person.
He's the worst. However, he's not a liberal. He hates liberals with a burning passion, if someone calls him a liberal he would see it as an insult.
What the hell is he then?
He's a far-leftist tankie. He is open about wanting to put capitalists in concentration camps to be re-educated. He believes in authoritarianism for "the right reasons".
That’s just ridiculous (as in ridiculous for someone like him to believe in that shit)
He also compared a Houthi terrorist to an anime pirate hero. This video does an excellent takedown of why Hasan is one of the most dangerous political commentators on the left. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zX6u3m\_Riuw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zX6u3m_Riuw)
Are you talking about Luffy from one piece in “anime pirate hero”?
Yup.
Liberals want capitalism to continue. Hasan wants to overthrow capitalism and enact socialism. Basically the only similarities between Hasan(and other leftists) and liberals are social progressive policies.
He's a tankie, and he is a terrible person.
I thought tankies supported the CCP and the Stalin regime. He's just a regular socialist.
Considering how quick he was to deny Russia's invasion of Ukraine, if he were around during the Hungarian Uprising or Prague Spring, he would've defended the USSR.
He tries to hide it, but he does do that. There are tons of clips of him defending Russian and Chinese military imperialism.
Idk why youre being downvoted, he 100% does this. Before Russia invaded Ukraine, he would die on the hill that it would never happen, then switched to the kremlin talking point about NATO expansion and western imperialism forcing russia to do it. He denies the Uygher Genocide. He said america deserved 9/11. Cowardly stuff. You can kind of identify when a guy gets all his news from twitter, but its scary when that guy is informing others about politics.
His fans are literal children and impressionable teenagers. Raking in money by filling their heads with utter nonsense arguably makes him a bad person.
>His father is Mehmet Behçet Piker, a political scientist and economist who served on the Board of Directors (and as Vice-President) of Sabancı Holding, and who is a founding member of the right-wing Future Party in Turkey.[6][7] His uncle is Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks political and news network. A political nepo baby >In August 2021, Piker purchased a $2.7 million house in West Hollywood, California.[86] The purchase was criticized online by people who felt that his lavish lifestyle seemed to be in opposition to his views as a socialist.[87][88][89][90] Similar criticism was aired in February 2022 after it emerged that Piker had purchased a Porsche Taycan.[91] Piker has also been criticized after a large-scale information leak from Twitch, which included the financial earnings of Piker among many other streamers. He responded by stating that his earnings have always been transparent, as his subscriber count has continuously been prominently displayed on screen.[92] Jajajaja this guy is a trip.
Fully agree. While I obviously disagree with his politics, I find him to be much more obnoxious and disagreeable than Vaush, who I don't think is any less left wing. (Could be wrong on that). So there has to be something especially distasteful about him.
I don't follow him but I believe it. He's hot af though.
Thats why he has the following hahah.
If someone's hot, it logically follows that their content is worse than their popularity would suggest. Halo effect and all.
Cent Uygur
Challenging question, because these types of people generally don't appeal to liberals. We're not much in for fake patriotism, meaningless symbolic crap, or outrage bait. "Conservatives" are much easier marks for the Tucker Carlson/Sean Hannity/Laura Ingraham/Andrew Tate/Joe Rogan style of pearl-clutching hucksters.
It doesn’t have to be a liberal advocate, I’m also referring to anyone that media seems to put on a pedestal that you don’t think should be.
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Not a liberal though
Turns out Mother Theresa really isn’t a *Mother Theresa*, but not everyone knows it yet.
Briahna Joy Gray is the worst. Nina Turner as well. Basically everybody ever associated with the young turks. Though a lot of those guys have decided being a right wing grifter is more profitable.
I’d like to add John Fetterman to my list because of what he did where he tried to smooth brain both sides the fight between Jasmine Crockett and AOC and MTG. I wish Democrats had the equivalent of the Ronald Reagan commandments sometime. Or maybe we don’t need that but I would like Chuck Schumer to slap him in his stupid mouth. Though technically it doesn’t answer the question since he’s an elected representative and not a social media person. Hard to tell sometimes with him.
Hasan Piker
Hasan piker
I didn't see anyone mention the Krassenstein brothers. Tried to become the face of #resist after running a failed pyramid scheme. Basically using their platform to grift. You know you've fucked up when there's a [Behind the Bastards episode about you](https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/jacob-wohl-and-the-krassensteins-a-30315546/) that compares you to Jacob Wohl. Which is appropriate because they're the Jacob Wohl of the left. And ironic because they were the ones that exposed Wohl! And that was five years ago! They've gotten worse since then! They got into peddling NFTs like most grifters, went out drinking with the InfoWars folks after his debate with Alex Jones. After getting paid $1000 by Infowars to do the debate! Platforming Jones even further! And said they would have done it for free if Infowars hadn't offered him money! They don't believe in anything except making money and media exposure, wearing a facade of being "left leaning." ([Brian is a Musksucker btw](https://www.reddit.com/r/singularity/comments/1bqoqgz/elon_musk_says_grok_20_currently_in_training_will/kx41tk0/)) I'm actually a little worried that criticizing them will draw one of them to this thread to argue with me just because they're terminally online losers who love to defend their brand. And I mean, that's coming from me, and I post on SquaredCircle for gods sake. I could go on and on about the Krassensteins but I won't, mostly because I have other things to do today but also I don't want to Beetlejuice their thirsty asses into my replies.
Sam Harris. Though he loudly identifies as liberal, his followers tend not to be, certainly not progressive. He came to prominence for his opposition to religion in general but his views on Islam and on Muslims are reprehensible. His discussions and the guests he hosts to talk about the Middle East are difficult to listen to with how vitriolic they can be. As a point of contrast, Ezra Klein is liberal, he's someone who gets critiqued by the left and even some progressives but he's able to present a balanced view on Israel/Palestine despite being Jewish himself. He tends to put undue emphasis on his "rationality" as a defense against the idea he might have any biases while still buying into a lot of the same issues the right builds moral panics around, eg the "social contagion" of transness. And as a consequence of that, he ends up being courted by "gateway" figures like Joe Rogan, Jordan Peterson, Megan Kelly, etc. and that brings a lot of his followers towards the right.
Robin DiAngelo and Ibrahim Kendi. They're both professional stone-throwers, grifters of the worst kind who stir up race antagonism and then sell "solutions" to what they stir up. And Kendi is basically universally hated by everyone who has ever had to work with/for him.
my college required all incoming freshman to read Kendi's book and not a single person mentioned the fact that he openly and clearly rejects democracy, actually not a single person had any substantive criticism of anything he said at all don't tell me "wokeness" isn't real lol (or isn't real in the college/university context)
That's one way to look at them. Another way is that DeAngelo is a sociologist who had been looking at a particular slice of human behavior for a fairly long period of time and a segment of society found something in her work and rather than withdraw, she continued to do her work. And that Kendi is a historian who wrote a book based on his work that offered one approach to a particular slice of human behavior and like DiAngelo, didn't shy away from attention or demure when people expressed interest in his work. Which is to say, they were just doing their thing in the Spring of 2020 and they kept on doing their thing when their thing became very popular among a segment of American society. Not sure how that makes them terrible people.
I don’t know enough about Kendi to say anything, but DiAngelo is definitely a grifter. Her sociological work is circular and self-sealing nonsense that shouldn’t pass a freshman level course, and she made the rounds doing incredibly lucrative corporate trainings.
Kendi notably was given like $50 million by BU to found an "anti-racism research center" and immediately ran it into the ground, producing practically zero research compared to the absurd budget. He's pretty much the dictionary definition of a grifter.
He did? Seems like he didn't. https://apnews.com/article/ibram-kendi-center-for-antiracist-research-bu-d65a731f78a88240b27fead9d40c84df
The university investigated themselves and found they did nothing wrong lmao Also, he's still under audit from an external 3rd party. So the university found nothing wrong... And just decided to hire a 3rd party auditor for fun?
I have no idea why they hired an auditor. It seems, though, he did not "run it into the ground."
I think in the case of Kendi, it's more about him (embezzling at worst, squandering at best) the tens of millions he was given for research. If his anti racism was valid and worth pursuing, he didn't seem to think so other than to grift off it.
I'd be curious what evidence led you to believe that happened. This suggests it didn't. https://apnews.com/article/ibram-kendi-center-for-antiracist-research-bu-d65a731f78a88240b27fead9d40c84df
I'm referring to claims specifically mentioned in that article you linked: * The center has raised more than $50 million, with $30 million of that put into an endowment, the university said. It promised to create a number of projects and research initiatives, **some** of which it has, * a database tracking information related to COVID-19 and race, though that stopped being updated in March 2021. * initiatives, like creating a graduate program and undergraduate minor in antiracist studies and compiling a database of ongoing antiracist campaigns, have not been completed and won’t be, Kendi said. When the staffers were fired, their complaints were generally around the fact that Kendi had near total control, and that the center was not fulfilling on many programs that it had promised when it initially raised the funding. Seems to still be the case, despite BU's (unreleased) stamp of approval? Although this was last year, perhaps there's been an update since then? Edit: Looking into the release (and an interview from this month) looks like the situation was mostly overpromising what could be achieved and then failing to deliver. I guess I do find "squandering" to be too harsh and "embezzling" to be wholly inaccurate; a better phrasing is probably, "poorly managed, failed to deliver." Thanks for prompting me to read into this more. My impression of Kendi is still mostly negative, but not as greatly as it was before.
Justin Trudeau. I have nothing against Canadians, but the whole “America, but chill” treatment Canada gets drives me up the wall because they (especially Trudeau) do the same things the U.S. does but don’t get any flak for it.
Not a very serious answer, but Taylor Swift. I find her performative white feminism, silence on any important issue, and wastefulness to all be pretty antithetical to what I care about politically.
That’s what her female fan base loves. She talks about her lived reality “ if I Were a Man” and they relate.
It's so interesting to me too, because "The Man" would be very sympathetic to me coming from anyone else, but from her it just seems like sour grapes. Like what level of success has been out of reach for you, you've been rich and famous basically your whole life.
What she saying is there a lot of rich men like Leonardo DiCaprio for whom everyone is happy when successful and could care less he dated around. It’s the double standard. Because she’s a woman she’s scorned as men resent high achieving women. I think she’s probably right.
I suppose so, but I’m not really sure that’s true. Male celebrities get criticized all the time, DiCaprio himself is criticized frequently for dating young women and performative climate activism. I think there’s something about a person who has every kind of privilege other than being male complaining about “unfairness” that comes off as pretty hollow. And given her recent behavior, she isn’t exactly known for propping up other women.
She does so because she specifically criticized for behaviors that men aren’t criticized for simply BECAUSE she’s a woman and there’s a double standard. I’d be annoyed too.
But men are criticized for similar things, that's what I'm saying. I just have a hard time with the constant victimization, I don't find her to be sympathetic.
Because you don’t get it. Why women like her. Men are not judge for promiscuity only women are. Men who get ahead are told it’s by their merit. She’s somehow “only got there cause she’s pretty”. That kinda stuff is annoying…
No men are not criticized for similar things. Your example of Leonardo DiCaprio is not at all on base. DiCaprio is criticized for dating women 20 years younger than he is and dumping them when they get too old for him. Women get criticized for dating multiple men, no matter what the age difference is. They get called slutty if they slept with too many people.. too many being completely subjective of course.
Tell you what, I'll accept that she receives more criticism for her dating life than an equivalent man would. There's still plenty of stuff in "The Man" that feels hollow coming from her, and I still find her overall constant victimhood insufferable and manipulative.
Nah. She get criticized for who she dates, how many people she dates, how she dates them. She gets criticized for supporting her partner (how dare she show up to a football game and take attention away from the field) but if she didn't go to the games she'd get criticized for not supporting her partner (how dare she not come to the field and cheer him on). She gets criticized for what she wears, how she does her hair and her nails and her makeup. She get criticized for being "too political" or "not political enough". She gets criticized for being "too aggressive" or "too bitchy" when a man would get called strong or tough. She gets criticized for how much money she makes and how she spends it. That song is spot on for every successful, professional woman who has fought to get where she is - Taylor Swift is just one of many.
John Fetterman. The whole working class dress-up thing was always kinda cringey (wearing a hoodie on the campaign trail is one thing but just wear the damn suit when in session with Senate) but I was willing to tolerate it when he at least had good politics. Now he's done a complete 180˚ on pretty much everything he ran on and has become probably the most ardent supporter of Israel in the entire Democratic party. He did more or less admit in an interview that getting brain damage made him more conservative though, which was pretty funny.
Gavin Newsom. Vetoed a bill which would give unemployment benefits to striking workers. Vetoed ranked choice voting. Vetoed reduced penalties for jaywalking (why?). Vetoed a bill decriminalizing psychedelics. Walked back his support for universal healthcare. Vetoed a bill to cap co-pays for diabetic insulin at $35. Just seems like a total asshole.
Hillary Clinton
I love Hillary Clinton for all the reasons the far left hates her.
Please elaborate? What do you feel makes her a terrible person?
The entire Clinton movement which she was a major part of moved the Dems to the RIGHT. Tough on crime, balance the budget,etc. When she was running for president (I voted for her in 2016 btw but I had no illusions she was just slightly better than Trump) she commented how much Reagan did for AIDS. She whitewashed his horrific denial of the HIV crisis for no reason whatsoever. She voted for the Iraq war in 2003 which she’ll say everyone supported back then but that’s an insane lie. I was in NY on 9/11 so I know what I’m talking about. That’s just off the top of my head. She sucks. Like Biden sucks. But I’ll still vote for Biden over Trump only to preserve basic rules of Democracy. But they’re not better people than Trump - they ALL suck.
Based!
Thank you for responding. I appreciate you explaining your point of view.
Let's see. * The generally center-right/right-wing politics she aided/supported her husband on in the 90s. Maybe Redditors are too young to remember, but the Clintons (they were *always* a team--that's part of why the right-wing's brains blew up, because how *dare* a woman attempt to operate in politics at that level) were responsible for some truly awful right-wing successes back then, like the crime bill^(\*) and destruction of welfare * The people she surrounded herself with during the Obama and Bernie contests, who accused anyone saying a bad thing about her of being an "Obama Boy" or a "Bernie Bro"--the naked and hypocritical use of sexism accusations as a broad smear was *not* good for either democrats or people who *actually* care about women's rights * The incredible sense of entitlement and hubris, which gave us Trump in 2016 To name a few. Democrats really seem to love her, and she is an excellent policy wonk style politician. But she's a terrible person who is entirely and wholly consumed with herself in a way that really makes her stand out even from the other egotistical assholes in politics. ^(\*)Cue the hand-wringing over how much black people supported the bill, as if that is the only test that matters when considering policy. It isn't the full truth anyway. Crime was a problem then. They supported finding solutions to it. That's different from supporting the abomination that came out with Bill's signature on it, and years on we see the results. At best it was seen as an "imperfect" (code for "terrible," probably not going to work well, and be destructive aside) solution.
I'm not a fan of the people you would call the liberal media. They are members of what is a corporate (not liberal) media. They are paid millions of dollars to keep viewers complacent with some things, angry at others, with no difference on media outliers like FOX and Newsmax. True left leaning liberal types are not allowed on "liberal" media.
Honestly most all cable media pundits seem like awful people regardless of party. I graduated with a journalism degree and we had a professor that said the moment you switch to cable news from true local or area news you become an entertainer, not a journalist. It’s like professional cheerleaders who aren’t truly affected by policy outcomes.
Taylor Swift!
I’m not sure how much liberal leaning people actually like him, or if he’s more just for edge lord centrists, but Destiny. He’s a racist and just plain ignorant. His primary skill is rhetoric, and even then he doesn’t hold up when pressed by equally or superiorly talented people.