2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Bernie Sanders Tells Berniebros To Knock It Off — ‘We Don’t Want That Crap’ [View all]99th_Monkey
(19,326 posts)Like many of the greatest media-propelled narratives, the notion that Bernie Sanders' online supporters are uniquely malicious harassers lacks credibility.
But this hasnt stopped several left-of-center news sources from making the striking, mostly false claim claim that armies of pro-Sanders activists on Twitteranimated by misogynyconstantly lash at members of the Hillary Clinton campaign and their allies in the press.
The bros who love Bernie Sanders have become a sexist mob, asserted Mashable. The Sanders campaign knows the Bernie Bros are a problem, declared The New Republics Jamil Smith. Bernie Sanders' Campaign Is Concerned About the 'Berniebro,' As They Maybe Should Be, suggested Jezebel. Buzzfeed News upped the ante with, The Bernie Bros Are a Problem and the Sanders Campaign Is Trying to Stop Them.
Its true enough that some Sanders staffers are making an effort to encourage social media users to be respectful toward people involved with other campaigns, and have apologized to a few specific recipients of Sanders-inspired hate. But heres the thing: Theres scant evidence that said apologies are actually warranted.
Baltimore Post-Examiner columnist Carl Beijer investigated the phenomenon and discovered this:
Look for the BernieBro, and at the most you'll find a few examples that are easily explained as statistically insignificant.
Or you will find the flat refusal to provide any examples at all.
Or you will find the repeated and demonstrable misrepresentation of quotes, as in the case of Rebecca Traister's article. Or as in a Jezebel article posted yesterday, where the "Berniebro" quoted turns out to be a woman.
Sometimes you'll get a variation on this when another journalist cites the misrepresented quote, as Jessica Valenti does for the article above. Or more recently, when BBC and Mashable both quote uncritically another journalist, Emily Nussbaum, claiming that "the Feel the Bern crew" called her "psycho" - when it was, in fact, a Tea Party Republican Congressman from Georgia....
http://reason.com/blog/2016/02/01/clinton-shilling-journalists-should-stop