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B for sure. I still won't do it except when I've had a few beers around friends. The professional backlash has the potential to be pretty brutal. Not to ment

B for sure. I still won't do it except when I've had a few beers around friends. The professional backlash has the potential to be pretty brutal. Not to mention how free people feel to call anyone supporting Trump a racist knuckledragger.

drewrv 10y ago
I'm not trying to be rude this is a sincere question: Why would you support a racist candidate if you weren't also racist? Imagine someone upset at being called a socialist, when all they did was vote for the socialist candidate.
- elgabogringo 10y ago
  You are a perfect example of the type of person we are talking about in the valley. Someone who wants to shut down debate by name calling. You don't actually want to have a debate, you just want to call me a name and hope that ends the discussion.
  - drewrv 10y ago
    It's a sincere question and I'd like an answer. I'm not trying to shut down debate I'm trying to hear your rationale.
    - thedevil 10y ago
      I'm not really on either side (I strongly dislike like Trump but also I don't identify with the left at the moment), but I'm curious about the argument here. Why do you call Trump racist? That's a very strong accusation and I'm wondering what drives your thinking on that.
      - foldr 10y ago
        Are you seriously asking this? Is his long history of racist, xenophobic, misogynistic and (for want of a better term) religiously-bigoted comments not enough for you? Are you asking us to go to Google and turn up one of the hundreds of compilations of these comments that you could very easily find for yourself? Have you forgotten that he was a birther, and still is? Is there anything short of a video of Trump at a KKK rally that would persuade you? It seems you're determined to pretend that he's not a racist despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
        ratbeard 10y ago
        It'd be handy if there was a page listing his comments you could point those who don't really follow what he's said to.
        foldr 10y ago
        For people who (a) have not been following US politics at all up to now, (b) can't use Google, and (c) have taken a sudden interest in Donald Trump? I didn't think many people matching those criteria would be reading my comment, but ok: http://lmgtfy.com/?q=trump+racist+comments http://lmgtfy.com/?q=trump+racist+comments Scroll down a bit and you'll see that even Paul Ryan has noticed that there's a problem here.
        thedevil 10y ago
        "Are you seriously asking this?" Yes, I seriously believe in asking questions. Birthers are ridiculous, but you don't actually have to be racist to be a birther. It's driven primarily by partisan politics. Racism just gets mixed in sometimes. Here's what I see, over and over again: Trump does something that is not exactly racist but ambiguous enough to be interpreted as such. The media goes wild and declares him Hitler. But when you read the details, it's not nearly as bad as the media claim. So Trump gets free publicity and makes his critics look unreasonable. A clear example of this is the "star of David" incident. It's a sleazy tactic, but very effective. He uses this tactic not just with racism, but with all kinds of manufactured fake scandals. If you mix in enough of these incidents with your own confirmation bias, you can be very confident that Trump is racist and yet not be able to provide any solid evidence. I suspect this is what is happening here.
    - MartinMcGirk 10y ago
      If that socialist candidate that you mentioned was big on, say, defense spending, and what you cared about most was defense spending, and the other candidate held the opposite view on defense spending, then it's not unreasonable that you might vote for the socialist candidate despite all the other character or political flaws that candidate might have. Someone big on defense spending might not believe in any part of socialism, but vote for the socialist anyway to get the result they want on the issue they care about. I imagine they'd get annoyed if people started assuming they were socialist based on WHO they voted for, rather than WHY they voted for that person.
    - fsaneq2 10y ago
      Alright, I'll bite, even though I can't vote here, so I suppose my opinion doesn't really matter and I would not say I am a strong supporter of either candidate. There are many issues with your question ("Why would you support a racist candidate if you weren't also racist"). First, most of what I've heard about Trump being a "racist" is his comments about illegal Mexican immigrants (which is not a race... it's a group of by-definition criminals, since last time I checked illegally entering the US is, well, not legal). Similarly for the more rigorous checks of people coming from countries having known radical islamist ties -- not a race (and FWIW, many leaders across the world are proposing essentially the same thing -- but Trump gets singled out for some reason). People also seem to paint Trump as being very anti-immigration, though I fail to see how Hillary is any better. Neither appears to have any plan to do anything about highly skilled immigrants -- Hillary does have some stop gap measures for non-skill-related immigration (why does this take priority over immigrants who contribute more to the economy..?), but that's about it. So then, I'm not that convinced he's a racist in the first place, at least not much worse than everyone else. It's not like you're either an angel or a racist -- probably everyone has some unconscious prejudices, and I'm not going to base my rating of people based on how carefully they choose their words. Content not delivery. But more importantly, it is entirely possible to support a racist candidate even if you are not racist. Simple example: one candidate is racist but has mostly reasonable policies. The other candidate is "not racist" but proposes to nuke all of the world the day they're elected. It's always a tradeoff.
      - drewrv 10y ago
        Thanks!
      - foldr 10y ago
        Trump's racist credentials go quite a way beyond his comments on illegal Mexican immigrants. For example, there are his comments about judge who allegedly can't do his job because he is "Mexican" (though born in Indiana): http://edition.cnn.com/2016/05/31/opinions/trump-attack-on-judge-opinion-obeidallah/ http://edition.cnn.com/2016/05/31/opinions/trump-attack-on-j... http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/07/politics/paul-ryan-donald-trump-racist-comment/ http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/07/politics/paul-ryan-donald-... And there were the times he retweeted bogus crime figures from a white supremacist twitter account: http://fortune.com/donald-trump-white-supremacist-genocide/ http://fortune.com/donald-trump-white-supremacist-genocide/ And of course the time he called for all Muslims to be banned from entering the USA.
- davidivadavid 10y ago
  It's pretty rude to ask such hilariously loaded questions with a straight face and expect a serious answer.
  - wfo 10y ago
    But when one of the candidates main strategies is to be so beyond-the-pale ludicrous that any honest question or statement about him is by definition 'loaded' -- nevermind the fact that he himself is the one doing the loading -- it can't be avoided. Quoting Trump in context is perceived as an attack on him. Showing video of him talking is perceived as an attack on him (that's what the most recent HRC anti-trump attack ads are. Just video of him talking with a little context and emotional window dressing). Literally describing his policy positions or advisers honestly is perceived as an attack on him.
- veidr 10y ago
  I'm not elgabogringo, and he should answer IMO, but I've voted for racists before so I will give you my own answer: Voting, particularly in the American 2-party system, is mainly about choosing the lesser of evils. Would it better to support a moderately racist candidate (keeping in mind most Americans are racist and you yourself probably are to a degree), or somebody utterly free of racist candidate convictions but who has an unshakable faith in military intervention abroad and whose ideas, if implemented, would lead to hundreds of thousands of noncombatants killed? What if a candidate was racist in her personal worldview, but at the same time supported the cessation of, and was running for an office with a significant impact on, the catastrophic, Nazi-genocide-equivalent "War on Drugs"? In other words, there are some things worse than racism, and other things equally bad. It's one variable in an extremely complex equation, and one that is also impossible to quantify.

drewrv 10y ago

I'm not trying to be rude this is a sincere question: Why would you support a racist candidate if you weren't also racist? Imagine someone upset at being called a socialist, when all they did was vote for the socialist candidate.

elgabogringo 10y ago
You are a perfect example of the type of person we are talking about in the valley. Someone who wants to shut down debate by name calling. You don't actually want to have a debate, you just want to call me a name and hope that ends the discussion.
- drewrv 10y ago
  It's a sincere question and I'd like an answer. I'm not trying to shut down debate I'm trying to hear your rationale.
  - thedevil 10y ago
    I'm not really on either side (I strongly dislike like Trump but also I don't identify with the left at the moment), but I'm curious about the argument here. Why do you call Trump racist? That's a very strong accusation and I'm wondering what drives your thinking on that.
    - foldr 10y ago
      Are you seriously asking this? Is his long history of racist, xenophobic, misogynistic and (for want of a better term) religiously-bigoted comments not enough for you? Are you asking us to go to Google and turn up one of the hundreds of compilations of these comments that you could very easily find for yourself? Have you forgotten that he was a birther, and still is? Is there anything short of a video of Trump at a KKK rally that would persuade you? It seems you're determined to pretend that he's not a racist despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
      - ratbeard 10y ago
        It'd be handy if there was a page listing his comments you could point those who don't really follow what he's said to.
        foldr 10y ago
        For people who (a) have not been following US politics at all up to now, (b) can't use Google, and (c) have taken a sudden interest in Donald Trump? I didn't think many people matching those criteria would be reading my comment, but ok: http://lmgtfy.com/?q=trump+racist+comments http://lmgtfy.com/?q=trump+racist+comments Scroll down a bit and you'll see that even Paul Ryan has noticed that there's a problem here.
      - thedevil 10y ago
        "Are you seriously asking this?" Yes, I seriously believe in asking questions. Birthers are ridiculous, but you don't actually have to be racist to be a birther. It's driven primarily by partisan politics. Racism just gets mixed in sometimes. Here's what I see, over and over again: Trump does something that is not exactly racist but ambiguous enough to be interpreted as such. The media goes wild and declares him Hitler. But when you read the details, it's not nearly as bad as the media claim. So Trump gets free publicity and makes his critics look unreasonable. A clear example of this is the "star of David" incident. It's a sleazy tactic, but very effective. He uses this tactic not just with racism, but with all kinds of manufactured fake scandals. If you mix in enough of these incidents with your own confirmation bias, you can be very confident that Trump is racist and yet not be able to provide any solid evidence. I suspect this is what is happening here.
  - MartinMcGirk 10y ago
    If that socialist candidate that you mentioned was big on, say, defense spending, and what you cared about most was defense spending, and the other candidate held the opposite view on defense spending, then it's not unreasonable that you might vote for the socialist candidate despite all the other character or political flaws that candidate might have. Someone big on defense spending might not believe in any part of socialism, but vote for the socialist anyway to get the result they want on the issue they care about. I imagine they'd get annoyed if people started assuming they were socialist based on WHO they voted for, rather than WHY they voted for that person.
  - fsaneq2 10y ago
    Alright, I'll bite, even though I can't vote here, so I suppose my opinion doesn't really matter and I would not say I am a strong supporter of either candidate. There are many issues with your question ("Why would you support a racist candidate if you weren't also racist"). First, most of what I've heard about Trump being a "racist" is his comments about illegal Mexican immigrants (which is not a race... it's a group of by-definition criminals, since last time I checked illegally entering the US is, well, not legal). Similarly for the more rigorous checks of people coming from countries having known radical islamist ties -- not a race (and FWIW, many leaders across the world are proposing essentially the same thing -- but Trump gets singled out for some reason). People also seem to paint Trump as being very anti-immigration, though I fail to see how Hillary is any better. Neither appears to have any plan to do anything about highly skilled immigrants -- Hillary does have some stop gap measures for non-skill-related immigration (why does this take priority over immigrants who contribute more to the economy..?), but that's about it. So then, I'm not that convinced he's a racist in the first place, at least not much worse than everyone else. It's not like you're either an angel or a racist -- probably everyone has some unconscious prejudices, and I'm not going to base my rating of people based on how carefully they choose their words. Content not delivery. But more importantly, it is entirely possible to support a racist candidate even if you are not racist. Simple example: one candidate is racist but has mostly reasonable policies. The other candidate is "not racist" but proposes to nuke all of the world the day they're elected. It's always a tradeoff.
    - drewrv 10y ago
      Thanks!
    - foldr 10y ago
      Trump's racist credentials go quite a way beyond his comments on illegal Mexican immigrants. For example, there are his comments about judge who allegedly can't do his job because he is "Mexican" (though born in Indiana): http://edition.cnn.com/2016/05/31/opinions/trump-attack-on-judge-opinion-obeidallah/ http://edition.cnn.com/2016/05/31/opinions/trump-attack-on-j... http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/07/politics/paul-ryan-donald-trump-racist-comment/ http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/07/politics/paul-ryan-donald-... And there were the times he retweeted bogus crime figures from a white supremacist twitter account: http://fortune.com/donald-trump-white-supremacist-genocide/ http://fortune.com/donald-trump-white-supremacist-genocide/ And of course the time he called for all Muslims to be banned from entering the USA.
davidivadavid 10y ago
It's pretty rude to ask such hilariously loaded questions with a straight face and expect a serious answer.
- wfo 10y ago
  But when one of the candidates main strategies is to be so beyond-the-pale ludicrous that any honest question or statement about him is by definition 'loaded' -- nevermind the fact that he himself is the one doing the loading -- it can't be avoided. Quoting Trump in context is perceived as an attack on him. Showing video of him talking is perceived as an attack on him (that's what the most recent HRC anti-trump attack ads are. Just video of him talking with a little context and emotional window dressing). Literally describing his policy positions or advisers honestly is perceived as an attack on him.
veidr 10y ago
I'm not elgabogringo, and he should answer IMO, but I've voted for racists before so I will give you my own answer: Voting, particularly in the American 2-party system, is mainly about choosing the lesser of evils. Would it better to support a moderately racist candidate (keeping in mind most Americans are racist and you yourself probably are to a degree), or somebody utterly free of racist candidate convictions but who has an unshakable faith in military intervention abroad and whose ideas, if implemented, would lead to hundreds of thousands of noncombatants killed? What if a candidate was racist in her personal worldview, but at the same time supported the cessation of, and was running for an office with a significant impact on, the catastrophic, Nazi-genocide-equivalent "War on Drugs"? In other words, there are some things worse than racism, and other things equally bad. It's one variable in an extremely complex equation, and one that is also impossible to quantify.