Today, the—oh, let’s go with comedian—Joe Rogan endorsed Bernie. Now, Rogan is a Grade A asshole. He has attacked every marginalized community with his “comedy.” He’s especially known for being transphobic, but he also negs on gays, women, and people of color. I don’t listen to him, so I’m sure I don’t know every shitty thing he’s said, but here are a few highlights.
There’s also that time when he compared walking in a black neighborhood to the movie Planet of the Apes. The time he speculated that molestation causes homosexuality. Plus all his transphobic shit, which is legion.
And I don’t want to hear about “but he’s a comedian.” Good comedy punches laterally or at oneself. Great comedy punches up. Comedy that punches down, like at any marginalized group, is shitty comedy, and if you laugh at that you should make better choices.
But the issue isn’t so much that Rogan endorsed Bernie—though a good question to ask is why he felt so comfortable publicly endorsing a candidate who supposedly is some kind of civil rights hero (even though Bernie calls civil rights “identity politics” and has fought them his entire career). No, the issue is that Sanders embraced that endorsement. Look at this shit. It’s a goddamn ad.
But see, Bernie has a history of associating with, even hiring, very problematic people.
In October 2019, he hired a guy named Matt Orfalea. Orfalea, hired because he made a Bernie fan video, also had at some point in the past created a monstrously offensive kinda-deepfake video about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I’m not going to discuss it further, nor post it. It’s out there if you want to see it. I don’t care why he says he created it. At the very least, it showed poor judgment.
There was a huge Twitter outcry, and Orfalea “resigned” before he ever started work. The campaign’s excuse was that they had hired him before he was fully vetted. Which … what the entire fuck.
Then in December, Sanders hired a guy named Darius Gordon to be an organizer. But soon thereafter, Twitter users found past tweets from him using the slur “f*gs,” calling women “fat bitches,” and talking about having “Jew money.” Not a lot of sleuthing required to unearth that, either. Just a quick Twitter search. The result? Huge outcry, then fired.
Also in December, Sanders endorsed professional asshole Cenk Uygur for the House of Representatives. Uygur has a history of antigay and misogynistic comments, likes to throw around the n-word, and is also apparently a proponent of bestiality.
Again, a few days after the endorsement, Sanders was essentially forced to withdraw it because of the outcry.
But he only disassociates himself from problematic people when left with no other choice.
David Sirota is a journalist who attacked other candidates with vitriol for quite some time before he revealed that he was actually working for Sanders’ campaign as a speechwriter. Not very ethical, for a journalist. He’s still on the campaign.
Briahna Gray, Bernie’s press secretary, regularly sics her large Twitter following on relatively small accounts who say negative things about Sanders. She also likes to get just close enough to doxxing to make it easy for her followers to complete the job, a dangerous practice that leads to people being harassed in real life. Sanders clearly approves of this behavior, because it continues unabated.
Sanders’ campaign co-chair Nina Turner is basically more of the same. She also QT’s and replies to Sanders critics, encouraging harassment.
All three express themselves in very unprofessional ways, which, whatever, but they are Bernie’s ride-or-die team.
Any politician can have problematic supporters. But Bernie embraces and, when possible, hires his. It’s a feature, not a bug. And we’re supposed to trust this guy to appoint a cabinet? To protect and enhance civil rights? I think the fuck not.
