Q: "Wait, are you serious?"

A: "No, I'm a Bernie supporter."

Bust out your sense of humor, it's a long campaign.

Yeah, people are so goddamn accommodating.

should be presenting in the General Discussion Forums

IOW, the candidate support groups can choose to be safe havens, free from even the mildest criticism of their candidate. Some groups go pretty far to keep the purity of support.

which implies those who do not wish to accept that groups rules, probably would eventually be locked from that group

And woe to the poster who accidentally wanders into a discussion thread without noticing that it's in one of exclusive tree houses.

As a host of a non-candidate safe haven group I've always warned posters before blocking unless the poster is an obvious troll. At least one of the candidate groups does not issue warnings -- the hosts go straight to a block on the merest slight. It's bizarre.

NOT going into GD Primaries. It's too toxic, too soon, IMO...

to address the needs of those who find such dialog productive.

The passive-aggressive stuff, like starting new threads to mischaracterize other posters, is childish & toxic.

I think Sanders, Clinton and O'Malley would do well as President, especially with a more liberal Congress.

So they make it so. I'm sick of the games.

We have enough on our plate to deal with the republicans. All our energy should go to that.

That is what it is. I was banned from the Elizabeth Warren group for posting (correctly) that she had repeatedly stated that she was not interested in running for POTUS. The delusional Warren group banned me for pointing out the truth. And she is still not running for POTUS. However, she is one helluva US Senator.

The division of DU into ideologically pure districts will be the end of us all.

If it came to a vote I would vote to eliminate all candidate centered safe havens on DU. Every time I click into one of them, I feel like I have walked into a church, where one has to be careful of what one says.

Well, fuck that!

I am sorry you got banned. Those of us who loved her and wanted her to run were probably just too optimistic. Oh well.

but it is not your fault.

Elizabeth Warren group. Regardless, I wasn't offended. It is THEIR group with THEIR mission. No one forces anyone to join or participate in any group.

Yeah, when you go into a safe haven for a particular group on DU, one should be careful of what one says. That is why each group has a mission statement, and if someone isn't willing to abide by that mission statement, then they should be over at the GD forums.

Honestly, I think people are taking this too personally

Where one has a safe haven, safe from any rational thought or argument. And remember, argument is an intellectual process, not the mere gain-saying of ones opponent. As Monty Python demonstrated so eloquently.

from Monty Python though

And the reason why I get to say so without being banned is that this is not a safe haven where disagreement is punished.

QED

In fact GD-P most resembles a WWE Steel Cage Death Match.

But the safe havens are the real problem. They have effectively walled of any rational discussion. And if rational discussion is not what DU is about, we might as well give up right now.

Yes, I am being a bit confrontational. Nevertheless, it am a firm believer of rational, polite, and reasoned discussion. That does not happen in these safe havens. I would argue that they are contrary to the democratic process.

They divide us, not unite us. And that is the big problem here. It very well might be why we lose.

The GOP has the US Senate, the House of Representatives, the Governors, and the state legislatures. We have the White House -- that's all.

One day folks will realize that we need to both hold that, and build things from the bottom up, not just from the top-down which in all of history has never, ever worked.

My best to you, my friend.

I don't mind having my thoughts and ideas challenged, I prefer it actually.

Back atcha...

but I was new, and my father had just died, and the dog ate my homework.

where no one posts anything.

group has gone metric.

even though I can't find them.

Because it becomes more difficult to respond to the attack.

candidate.

However, even special groups can step over the boundary, and are subject to TOS

The SOP dictates whether the group is a vibrant place to discuss a campaign or simply a Saint Candidate Admiration Society. Some in the latter category act like private clubs where criticism of a member (in the form of a TOS alert) is sufficient for blocking the alerter.
Ask me how I know this.

All other attacks, no matter how idiotic, are allowed. That is what happened in the Balkans.

It is idiotic.

the special groups who are on the jury

The safe havens are the Balkanization of DU. They serve no useful purpose except to cut off reasonable discussion.

They are a horrendous appellation which no reasonable person should support.

whose main purpose seems to be to whine and complain about how mean the supporters of that other candidate are. I hardly ever even look in them any more, and I'm definitely scared as hell to actually post anything, lest it be construed as (gasp!) a criticism.

I don't think people should be allowed to be banned from candidate groups. If someone's behavior breaks the site rules, they can be banned from DU overall but enforcing certain kinds of speech and banning others is straight up fascist behavior.

Then again, our candidates are civil and polite to each other, and recognize how important it is to avoid helping the Republicans tear them down. Half the people here at DU act like left-wing Freepers--vicious and ignorant, uncaring about facts and ideas that don't fit with their personal beliefs, and dedicated to preserving their preconceived judgements at all costs.

DU has absolutely NOTHING in common with Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders, thank god. Both of them are sane, reasonable people.

I totally agree with that sentence. I think it is quite silly to have safe havens for supporters of a political candidate.

smokey nj

Re: i got banned for this,

Mail Message

You were blocked because you are a Hillary supporter

Now, I am careful to see which group is posting be for I click.

I am a strong Obama and Hillary supporter but I don't hesitate to criticize them when I think it is warranted. And I suspect that such criticism would not be well received in those groups.

Or is it "Echo Chambers"?