Clarification, for what it’s worth: It’s an official campaign website but it was an event profile written and posted (presumably) from a Bernie volunteer organizer/supporter. It was still on the campaign website on March 8 (which is what was time-posted when I looked it up myself in the google cache this morning). The event is from October but it was not removed until some time after March 8, 2016.
Bottom line: This isn’t about Bernie Sanders being sexist. It isn’t even about his campaign knowingly hosting the campaign event information on their website. For me, this is what you get though when you set a tone in your campaign that disparages differences in opinion with unflattering ethical and character assessments. Disparagement campaigns almost always unleash ugly supporter crap like this. ESPECIALLY when you fail to train your organizers properly.
It’s been reported before by observers that sometimes Bernie supporters pivot from Feel the Bern chants to Bern the Witch chants. Is that on Bernie, personally? Well, he never led those chants. So there’s that. But he runs a campaign that is almost wholly built (at this time) on castigating and disparaging Hillary.
I’m against the red-baiting I’ve been seeing from some Hillary supporters. I called out someone earlier today on twitter for that very thing. I’m also against pretending that Bernie is racist for failing to compete in most Southern states or downplaying their significance. Those charges are silly. But I have never ever seen volunteers on a Hillary-run campaign site organize an event around disparaging Bernie. Never.
If we hold Trump responsible for his supporters’ racist conduct, should we not be allowed to argue that Bernie is setting a tone for character attacks on Hillary like this one? Does anyone really believe that the same campaign tone that nurtured Bern the Witch for at least the last five months did not also intend a similar theme over #WhichHillary?
Maybe I’m just an old-school progressive but I think the questions are fair, if not yet the accusations.
