Kossacks4Sanders Reddit Turns to the Darkside

Some of you may recall that after the big exodus from Daily Kos following the Ides fo March decree, a subreddit called Kossacks_For_Sanders was created by a number of former prominent Bernie supporters. Over time, as other Sanders' subreddits have imploded due to subversion or infiltration by Clinton operatives, many people saw K4S as their refuge. There, topics were generally not censored (I say generally because in fact, some were). I suspect many c99ers are familiar with K4S as I have seen many of you both here and over there.

Well, the policy of openness regarding what topics were acceptable for discussion took a biog hit yesterday when the moderators of K4S posted the following:

Kossacks For Sanders began as a community dedicated to the support of Bernie Sanders and the principles of democratic socialism that he has been promoting for many years. Initially it focused on supporting his campaign for the Democratic nomination for POTUS. That campaign has come to an end, and Bernie is no longer running for President. However, he is still actively campaigning to build a long term movement that will support the principles of democratic socialism and the other related policy positions. We will continue to actively support Bernie in his efforts. He has launched a national initiative under the banner of Our Revolution. His campaign staff is being brought back to operational status and it appears they are using some of the same strategies that were used successfully in the presidential campaign. OR is not about the presidential election. It will not be used to support the Hillary Clinton campaign. It will be focused entirely on down ballot progressive candidates in the 2016 election and will also be looking to support such candidates beyond that election. This is an initiative that KFS intends to get behind.

Bernie Sanders was the only person who we saw as a positive and constructive choice for POTUS. We do not support the campaigns of any of the remaining active candidates. This sub will deemphasize the focus on the presidential election. There will be a daily mega-thread devoted to the presidential election. Material relating to the candidacies of:

Hillary Clinton Gary Johnson Jill Stein Donald Trump

must be placed in that mega-thread. Material about those candidates not placed there will be removed.

Our initiative here remains entirely separate from and independent of /r/Political_Revolution. We support Bernie and his Our Revolution as do they, but we will do it in our own way and on our own terms. We welcome your input from you about ways in which we can be effective in our efforts to support Bernie's vision. This policy statement is a joint effort by the members of the mod team who have reached a consensus on it. It will become effective after we have the opportunity to review the comments.

If you see yourself as someone who basically does not support Bernie Sanders, then this is probably not a place where you will feel at home.

Frankly, I was disappointed, but moreso, I was extremely upset. This is not how to build a revolutionary movement, dictating what can and cannot be discussed, and placing certain topics in their own little ghetto to marginalize them. Here was my response in the thread to that post last night:

So it's about Bernie's revolution now, not a political revolution? It's about him and his ideas on how to do things rather than a collective effort by everyone to the left side of the oligarchy that controls the D and the R brands to come together and create a movement that will change the duopoly? You're making a big mistake folks. You are cutting your little slice of the internet off from a larger movement. You are advancing the interests of TPTB when you say that there is only one path to the political revolution. Even Buddha never said that his way was the only path to enlightenment. I'd rethink what you're doing unless you have some specific reason I don't understand for what you are doing. IMO, it's wrong from a movement building standpoint, it's wrong from a communications and collective action standpoint and it's wrong from a people standpoint. Shutting down or curtailing speech is not a good thing. You had a good thing going, a site that could be a place where people with many different viewpoints, strategies, tactics and opinions could all come together and speak to one another, encourage one another, help one another and work with one another. I have no idea why you would want to do change this. No good idea in any event. Bernie never said it the revolution was about him, it is about us - all of us making the changes and taking the actions necessary to effect change. How does what you are doing with this decision to limit what can and cannot be the focus of this subreddit advance that goal?

Perhaps I was wrong about that. Maybe K4S was never as open and welcoming as I imagined, unlike this place. In any event, a subreddit that had grown to well over 4000 members may soon see significant departures. Feel free to express your own opinion about what the K4S mods have brought down upon their heads and feel free to speculate as to their motives.

Ps. I can recommend another subreddit, created by former mods at K4S who left after they saw what they considered censorship and "sheepdogging" known as WayOfThe Bern, which seems to be much more open to any and all matters one wishes to discuss, promote, educate or simply raise hell about.

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Just removed my bookmark from K4S and will check out the new link.
There were some interesting posts when K4S started, the recent list of Don'ts was unpleasant. Need for power & control is as corrupting as we know it to be. Sad.

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34 members, less than a month ago, & now there are over 700, mostly refugees from other subreddits that were compromised by pro-hillary infiltrators.

i try to divide my time between the way & c99 b/c so many good folks inhabit both places, & i like the diversity of style each represents.

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Steven D's picture

That's why I posted a link to your reddit site.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

a total bummer. mahakali overdrive and I became close after that whole Ides of March fiasco. I'm sorry to see she's leaving, but I know she didn't have the time even when she was doing it.

That being said, I'm glad you guys started wayofthebern. It's frustrating when formerly open places suddenly create rules that are not needed or wanted. See: TOP.

Oh, btw: kos wrote some stupidass blog post a few days ago wherein he seems utterly convinced that people who left with the Ides of March returned to Dkos in earnest in July. LOL.

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I miss Colorado.

prodigal ones returning to the fold. either, his numbers are pretty bad, or morale is rock bottom, otherwise he wouldn't have bothered.

i always had a good relationship with mo, but the no-trump-discussion rule was something i couldn't agree with, so i left. hopefully, the same thing that happened at k4s won't be repeated at the way.

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elenacarlena's picture

up as of July and beginning of August. If you look at Quantcast, they're bouncing around a lot, but July was quite big. Looks like August might be falling back off, but it's still early.

I assume a lot of it's new users. But they're all anti-Trump all the time, it's kind of boring, so I can't imagine the numbers will stay up. It would be interesting, too, to see what kind of advertising they're doing. And I think the real story will be after November, when Hillary is unlikely to continue to pay her shills.

Even if Trump generates traffic, I do get tired of news about him. There might be something to be said for a Trump ban. He says outrageous things in order to play the media. I used to love it when TYT reported on him but blanked out his face.

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The wall-to-wall coverage of Evil!Trump is on Hillary's orders. The money men, including the Kochs and the five guys who own all US media, have given the entire media apparatus to Hillary, and on her command, all guns are blazing at Trump. I just came across an editorial--I forget where it was--headlined, "The Election Is a Referendum on Trump." Um, no it isn't. It's a choice between two people, one of whom we are quite certain is a criminal.

Every time you see a Trump story today, it's not for clicks. Other people are sick of Trump, too. It's for propaganda. She exercises fascistic control over the media. Or rather, her donors do.

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elenacarlena's picture

15 mil unique visitors? I'm disgusted.

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but wanted to get it further up in the thread: turns out that mahakali overdrive is not at all cool with this. I went on Reddit to find her and alert her to the shenanigans the New Overlords have instituted in her stead (in case she didn't know), and I found her comments.

Looks like I will not be contacting her directly right now, as she's in the hospital. Sad It can wait. Jesus, how stressful.

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I miss Colorado.

katchen's picture

even said she helped draft their little diktat.

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is from the comments she left. For the tl;dr-impaired, the comments basically boiled down to this:

"I am not down with this. It was not explained to me this way when the mods contacted me. I'm busy as fuck and in the hospital and am only here because a friend PMed me about this last night. I think the mods were coming from a good place, but even if their intentions were grand, the obvious community blowback from this is so extremely negative that they should seriously rethink their decisions about the direction of this sub. This is ridiculous."

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I miss Colorado.

katchen's picture

of your initial post--somehow I overlooked that. I hope she's ok.
What a clusterfuck.

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I have always found the owner of Kossacks_For_Sanders, mahakali-overdrive, a very controlling and dominating owner of the site, who banned me for disagreeing with her. Now suddenly, after being very enthused about the site after her recent return from a vacation, she says she is leaving and has no influence over the group of moderators. At the same time, a moderator Angry_Architect is mocking those who complain about the new suppressive policy with no fear of being put in his place, AS IF HE OWNS THE SUBREDDIT. What kind of deal was made when mahakali-overdrive left?

I would ask this question if I hadn't been banned, but someone needs to ask her. Did mahakali-overdrive sell Kossacks_For_Sanders unknowingly to those who may have ill will toward the site? Did she receive anything? Was she threatened? This is extremely uncharacteristic of mahakali-overdrive's opinion of herself as being a real fiery independent radical for her to say she disagrees with the direction of her moderators and for her to even tolerate the abuse of her friends and NOT DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT? Like replacing abusive moderators. She acts as if she sold the site and now has no more influence than any other commentator. We have a right to know what happened. Was she compensated or threatened in any way to go from great enthusiasm about the future of Kossacks_For_Sanders to completely leaving it in a matter of days?

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That MO teaches at a college/university? Classes are about to start/ have started so her workload has picked up. She's notoriously over committed, so doesn't gave the time to commit to the site.

Yes, angry architect was a jerk last night, as was operarat, both mods. I read their comments as defensive, which is understandable given the blow back they received from us.

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Mahakali-overdrive said she was now too busy recently, but a very short time ago she was wildly enthusiastic about greatly expanding Kossack_For_Sanders to a website, many work groups, having a team of programmers etc. She could not have planned to drop all of these new projects at the end of the Summer. Something significant changed that she has refused to disclose or I missed. She is withholding information that will inevitably lead to speculation. She even said there would be speculation about her leaving when she announced it. Doesn't she owe the people who invested in what she described as "our" home an explanation as to how it became her "moderators" home with the people being disrespected and told to get lost? (remind you of how the David Brock CTR employees treats progressives?)

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on the Daily Kos Helpdesk.

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I miss Colorado.

elenacarlena's picture

with this. MO was a good TOP buddy. OaWN too, who I saw trying to make peace on Reddit. I hope if you have a way to contact them, you'll invite them to post more here! They were here, I assume they're still members.

W4B was a great group at TOP, but of course staying there became problematic. We're still there, but almost dormant.

Damn. They said she just had a lot of work. I hope she'll be out of the hospital soon.

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Steven D's picture

for doing the legwork on that.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

Or whatever the hell his name was.

It's a site I read when Kerry was running. My neighbor pointed me there again early this year to read some article. That's when I saw the obvious corporate takeover unfolding.

Micropenis is just one tiny, tiny prick in the whole media assault. You really need to read the exposes of her strategy that have appeared here and there. Then the scales fall from your eyes and you see every story in a different light.

Trump? Hitler? Come on. Her control of the press is much, much more like Hitler's than Trumps. At this point if he swats a fly while speaking, the NYT will have a six-inch-tall headline screaming "TRUMP MURDERS HECKLER!"

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Roy Blakeley's picture

by the conventions and lead up to the conventions. I wonder if bots can generate unique views. I don't see why they couldn't and DKos has legions of bots among their users....and it is sooooooooo boring to see yet additional anti-Trump screeds. After you have seen 100 diaries about how evil Trump is and unqualified for any office, there is not much informational or entertainment value in seeing yet another (actually about 5 was my saturation point).

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i meant that no discussions of voting for trump, either strategically to deny her royal corporateness the wh, or out of total disgust (or vengeance) were allowed.

i felt it was too draconian, so i left.

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But I'm of the opinion that Kos is buying views. The day LD posted BNR #365 is the day I said good bye.

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when I posted my rant the other day and I never did, so this is gonna be a little OT.

On topic, though, yeah -- kos' page views went up significantly in June and July, I think, but none of the Ides of March people came back, or at least not that I'm aware of. (I don't pay that close attention anymore, but I srsly doubt it.) Is OPOL still gone? Yup. Dallasdoc? Yup. Steven D? Yup. jamess? Yup. LaFeminista? Yup. I think you get the picture. Blum 3

Anyhoo, back to off topic, lol. So I do this thing here now where I write a blog post, and then I wait for people to comment, and if they don't respond in a timely manner like they did immediately on TOP, I get tired of waiting and fall asleep. LOL. I swear to God, I am SO impatient, it's ridiculous.

Four hours later, I wake up and there are 42 comments and I'm like "shit fuck goddamnit I suck!" So I promise this community I will honestly try to do better! I hate drive-by diaries, they're lame!!

Anyhoo anyhoo, back to your comment I was gonna respond to in that other diary. I don't know how I lucked out with the sheer number of activists in my area, but Green Bay has a strangely special group of awesome people who still want to carry on The Revolution for Bernie, but without him as a figurehead. Many of us are actively helping out Jill Stein and the Green Party, but a bunch of us have split off are helping with Bernie's Revolution (down-ticket races only). I'm going to be doing both, but many people are not.

It makes me sad that we have splintered, but I'm really lucky to have so many friends who care so much about the world that they want to make a change for the better. I even have a few friends who are running for office now. Smile

Not to put too fine a point on it, but Green Bay got a shout-out in a national phone call with the Bernie Sanders people. We had a ground game up, running, and highly organized before Bernie's staffers even showed up here. Heh.

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I miss Colorado.

JekyllnHyde's picture

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A riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma

lunachickie's picture

he's full of shit if he claims anything else. I have YET to find another Dem in real life who knows what it is, let alone reads it regularly.

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WaterLily's picture

But they fall squarely within the group of people who have drunk the HRC Kool-Aid.

They particularly love to repost diaries on Facebook to support their delusions. I find it Hill-arious.

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Infrequently I will go back to top to read, but I will not log in. They get bat shit crazier as time goes on, and they talk about nothing that I care about.

I seldom post at K4S, TPW and the Way except to say hello, long time no see. I read there on occasion and sometimes find unique stories that the others don't have. There is also a lot of duplication between the four of us, but each of us has our own style and our own platforms.

Being totally biased, I still like cp99 the best. JtC did a good job of picking a platform that he could work with to bring the comforts of our old home to this one, and he did a great job of turning the physical environment into little top 4. Johnny and Joe set a great tone, and moderation is far and few between. I love the fact that we can talk about anything we want as long as its civil and not a lie, illegal, or nuts. Nuts to be defined as "you'll know when you see it".

I think your letter is a good one Steven. Sounds like K4S is undergoing radical change.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

elenacarlena's picture

here! I agree, the tone here is great. Better than DK4, actually; fewer snide comments.

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I read that argument too. I refuse to give TOP a click. I think I read it in an email. I never unsubscribed because I'm tracking the various ways they get money. I think it's generally known that when you give to candidates through TOP they take a cut. But the operation has expanded.

This week I learned I could purchase wind generated energy while giving Kos a cut. I think last week it was financial services. The opportunities are boundless. I don't think they've covered magazine subscriptions yet. I can't wait for the opportunity to obtain a Daily Kos Visa Card. The value of 2% of my purchases will no doubt go to Kos. They should have a contest to decide the design of the card. My idea, and anyone is welcome to use it since I don't go there, is a profile of a serious Markos with red and white stripes as a background. I left out blue deliberately. It might offend Republicans for Hillary.

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Any Whooo...thanks for the laugh.

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I don't mean to disparage wayofthebern at all.

But Reddit is known for moderators flouncing off and shutting down communities with 50,000 members. To the point where it's an ongoing joke: one of the moderators of the Serial podcast sub announced it would shut down until next season. It was an April Fool's joke, but it was credible because it happens so often.

It's great to have a presence on Reddit, but what's really needed is a place where mods can be restrained.

And protected from infiltration, as well. Does anybody really think that one a-hole moderator with his sophomoric smirk isn't a paid astroturfer? He's there to shut that whole thing down. If he got doxxed, I bet he'd turn out to be a familiar figure from other websites.

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Alphalop's picture

getting longer and longer but I was like, "Whatever." then when the prohibitions on what could be said started rolling out I rolled on.

I don't tend to hang at places where I have to worry about others pouncing on me for disagreement.

If I wanted that kind of garbage policy I would have stayed at the GOS. Smile

When you are trying to build a movement the goal should be inclusion, not exclusion.

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"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me

It's definitely going to push away the millennials and other users that migrated from the S4P subreddit when their moderators started with the heavy handedness. In general, the folks that use reddit don't take kindly to that sort of approach. Trying to control community content on a site where almost nothing is out of bounds--which is precisely what reddit is--just seems silly. Not to mention the fact that the Political Revolution subreddit has the exact same mission as what they're proposing.

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OLinda's picture

If you post there again, you might want to give readers the c99 link.

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Steven D's picture

as an alternative site, but I've also heard that other sites who promote themselves there have seen their posts removed or hidden as spam. So, not sure how much I will be posting there going forward. I had a difficult time convincing the mods there the other day to allow a link to one of my videos, which they initially hid from view twice (I re-posted it a second time after changing the title) until suddenly I saw the repost of that was visible and people were able to comment on it. No explanation was ever given to me by any mod as to why it violated their rules in the first place.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

I got distracted and when I came back you were gone. I always watch your videos.

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Moderators, please fix.

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Here's what's posted there for readers to check out:

Links To Keep Around:
Other Sites/Subs of Interest:
OUR REVOLUTION
BRAND NEW CONGRESS
BERNIECRATS.NET
BALLOTPEDIA STATE ELECTIONS

Visit Our Friends from the Bernie News Roundup at The Progressive Wing:
THE PROGRESSIVE WING

Visit Our Friends from Caucus99Percent:
CAUCUS99PERCENT

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"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." --Jiddu Krishnamurti

Then noticed 99 is still linked to K4S and wondered about that.

am also curious about the timing of this change and MO leaving.

Any connection?

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Orwell was an optimist

Was supposedly involved in the discussions on this new direction. And she always pushed activism there.

Well, they sure shot activism in the foot.

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What a tone deaf response from that one mod. It's no wonder people are unsubscribing. They've lost what, like more than 100 members in the last 16 hours? When the community is bringing up legitimate concerns, the response shouldn't come in the form of sarcasm and snide condescension.

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Steven D's picture

condescension and lack of tolerance for those expressing differing opinions does tend to follow naturally in my experience.

Apparently, according to former mods there, this has been going on under the radar for some time. It's just now they have decided to go public with their new order.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

elenacarlena's picture

I was hoping to meet up with her over there some day, and/or see her here more often.

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Steven D's picture

She is a professor in real life and hee day to day responsibilities with the Fall term coming up did not allow her to continue maintaining that reddit she wrote. The current mods in the comments say she was on board with all the "changes" they are making to that site.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

elenacarlena's picture

if they're bleeding members?

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Bollox Ref's picture

Edit.

As a member of K4S (generally lapsed), I will give WayOfTheBern a go.

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Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.

Steven D's picture

Thanks JtC, Joe et alia.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

Lily O Lady's picture

from the room and the idea of the revolution is to elect down-ballot candidates. That's how Repubs, Tea Partiers and ALEC have become more and more powerful. That and the DINOs willingness to play along with their goals far too often.

Concentrating on down-ballot races while summarizing the presidential race seems a reasonable strategy to me. Not all progressive sites need to conform to a certain formula, IMO. I can appreciate various approaches.

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"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"

Thaumlord-Exelbirth's picture

There's already a subreddit dedicated to the down ballot races called Political Revolution. The decision of the moderators of K4S is making it so there are less approaches, and is contrary to Sanders' message.

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developments, will c99 continue to link to the k4s subreddit?

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we originally linked to K4S because MO was also a member here, now that she's gone from K4S we'll link to WayOfTheBern.

Besides, the recent changes there flies in the face of this site's mode of operation.

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.

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Steven D's picture

I'm not an admin here. For myself, I believe in a free flow of information, with nothing out of bounds. When you begin to limit what constitutes proper and improper discourse on a political forum, you also limit the ability to cooperate with those who are your natural allies, and you end up serving the interests of those who wish to keep the left/progressive/whatever the hell we call ourselves divided and fighting with each other rather that working in a variety of ways to bring about change. I don't agree with everything everyone says here, but I sure as hell don't want to censor their right to say it or what they can and cannot post about.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

i used to see your posts on k4s before i left for wayofthebern, & hope you'll crosspost there, too. i've been suggesting to new arrivals that they check out c99.

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Oldest Son Of A Sailor's picture

The down voting from outsiders...
The narrow focus of electing Bernie...
The fact that the Reddit Gods could decide to delete the subreddit based on a Hillary hot flash...
Group moderators excessively steering the group direction...
Infiltration of the group by hillbots...
The way Reddit works in general, it is hard to navigate, and re-find things, and time consuming...

I kinda like C-99 myself, the only thing I don't care for is the infiltration of Shills and the tolerant way of attempting to "Educate" them... IMHO they are incorrigible and they have enough other places on the net to post their garbage...

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"Do you realize the responsibility I carry?
I'm the only person standing between Richard Nixon and the White House."

~John F. Kennedy~
Economic: -9.13, Social: -7.28,

shills. i've been spending most of my time on the wayofthebern subreddit lately, & didn't realize this site's become a target for the hillpeople. it doesn't surprise me, tho. for folks who claim to have a candidate who's inevitable, they sure sound nervous.

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lunachickie's picture

it is a target warms the cockles of my heart. I've never been a more wayward target, because there's not a damned thing they can say to me that's going to change my mind. And it's fun to watch them flail sometimes.

for folks who claim to have a candidate who's inevitable, they sure sound nervous.

As they should be.

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"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." --Jiddu Krishnamurti

c99p is not infiltrated by shills. WTF is with all of the paranoia?

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i didn't say c99's infiltrated by shills. i said it was sad to hear that was the case.

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between your last two sentences?

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his claim that this site had been infiltrated by hillary shills. it was never my claim. i was only offering my reaction to it.

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I will eat my fucking laptop.

(I saw that response to something on Reddit the other day, so full circle FTW! YAY! :P)

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I miss Colorado.

What about all the posts along the lines of "I'm voting for Jill Stein unless it looks like Trump is close, then I'll vote for Hillary to stop Trump?"

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

elenacarlena's picture

I might do that myself. Still evaluating.

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TheOtherMaven's picture

Jill unless it looks close, then Trump to Stop Hillary.

I'm not playing that game, it's Tic-Tac-Toe and almost always ends in stalemate (unless one player screws up bigtime).

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There is no justice. There can be no peace.

not shilling for Hillary.

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

lunachickie's picture

I think there's some difference of opinion on what exactly constitutes a shill vs. a troll vs. a garden-variety asshole.

FWIW, you and I have had that discussion offline. I still think a few walk among us that you don't agree that they're either one, but I've reached an acceptable level of detente, so to speak--I try to give 'em a much wider berth and just try not to read them. That's not always easy, but I really do try! If nothing else, I really try not to call it out, and take it to the admins. Blurting it out in front of others (a name, a comment) isn't cool and it got me in trouble here already, lol!

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Oldest Son Of A Sailor's picture

I consider shill, troll, etc to be universal terms for the same thing, there have been a few essays already here on spotting them, and perhaps I've spent too much time as an internet warrior with "Teh Teabagged Ones" and Hillbots (Little Difference Between Them) over the years, that I just automatically grumble and scroll past the screed to better reading now...

I've been doing that with increasing frequency here lately...
Their MO is the same as a teabaggers...
I agree with you but, and here comes the gish gallop or circular argument...

Nothing wrong with your moderation JTC, It's my intolerance...
When they come around I don't take off the safety, I'm already loading new clips... LOL
You've got a fine place here, and yea we've been infiltrated enough to notice, but... we aren't overrun yet...

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"Do you realize the responsibility I carry?
I'm the only person standing between Richard Nixon and the White House."

~John F. Kennedy~
Economic: -9.13, Social: -7.28,
elenacarlena's picture

about identifying shills, we just engage in a variety of conversations about issues, politics, and politicians.

If it becomes clear they're shills, the moderators and/or site owners will get rid of them.

Agreed that they seem nervous! They've decided to swing right to pick up Repubs, so why do they care what the left is doing? Let us go for Jill, write in Bernie, or not vote at all. They claim they have it all sewn up with disaffected Repubs. They've done the math. Yet they seem to have a confidence problem.

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Gish-galloping. I forget the latest number of paid shills Brock has unleashed on the Internet. How many millions is he spending? Their goal isn't just to manufacture consent, but also to disrupt other people's organizing. Which they do by starting arguments that won't convince anybody, but do successfully thread-jack and forum-jack other discussions.

I don't think this is a good time to stand on ceremony or ask rhetorical questions about what a shill truly is. Generally, if somebody starts promoting Hillary online, it's time to at least take the safety off.

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elenacarlena's picture

But I still think the best response is to let the Admins and/or mods handle it.

If you don't want to respond to someone that strikes you as a shill, then just don't respond. If you know it's a shill, alert the mods.

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Love your reference to "Generally, if somebody starts promoting Hillary online, it's time to at least take the safety off."

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enhydra lutris's picture

x says something, convinced of its truth and reality, and, meanwhile
y says the exact same thing for pay.

How to tell which is which and why should anybody care? To paraphrase a comment I made elsewhere on a similar subject, all that matters is whether the argument is valid, whether the allegations are true.

You or I or someone else may decide, after seeing enough commentary from a given poster , to consider that poster's commentary as worthless, because we deem them generally uninformed, generally illogical, or a troll or hireling. To try to convince others to ignore them based on our inferences is a form of argumentum ad hominem. If we cannot trust our fellow readers to dismiss their posts out of hand, and think it imperative that such posts be ignored, then it is incumbent upon us to refute or debunk their posts, not to accuse them of stupidity, insincerity or wrongful intent.

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Haven't we seen it's wrong?

Example: If certain climate models are correct, the world may literally end in about 80 years or so. Even if not, really bad things are likely to happen. All because paid shills created a false impression of controversy where there is no controversy. And intentionally wasted the time of people who tried to "refute or debunk" them.

Hillary is following the lead of her donor investors. Trying overwhelm the airwaves with bullshit to crowd out everybody else. It doesn't matter whether the arguments are "valid" or not. The sheer number of people making them is a manufactured illusion. And the volume is designed to mask all other speech.

Stopping to treat each Hillbot like a potentially legitimate actor is like wasting time trying to convince each individual cell in your pancreas not to go cancerous.

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WaterLily's picture

Thank you.

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For the Clinton campaign to leave a vote unclaimed is much the same as the Clinton Foundation leaving a dollar on the table. It goes against the grain.

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elenacarlena's picture

It's not enough to win, they must beat every opponent until they bow down in worship.

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Cassiodorus's picture

13882274_1324534560898033_5591728933105078854_n.jpg

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"The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide" -- Moon of Alabama

hester's picture

the site made no candidate endorsements, etc and anyone was welcome to post anything. He has reminded Pro-hillary essayists that their 'essays' might not be well received and they are not well received.

We can agree to disagree. I will never vote for Trump, Hillary, Johnson or Jill. But honestly I understand anyone who votes for any of them.... it's not my call. So I think this place is right to 'tolerate' pro-hillary posters. I don't think they stay around that long, fwiw,

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Don't believe everything you think.

thanks for reminding me why i don't come here very often.

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and then tell me why that attitude is any different than the attitude many folks left Daily Kos for?

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very often.

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shaharazade's picture

This is not a partisan site, or a Bernie, Jill, Hill, Trump, Johnson or any pol followers site. It's also not a flip side of dkos. To say we're infiltrated with Hillary trolls who are denigrating Jill or Bernie is just crazy paranoia. I've read a few essay making the case for Hillary and they did not get a microphone at all. They scurried off as they got no traction. who knows maybe they learned something. The few I read were people from OS who are not paid shills. Some of them were former Bernie supporters who are following Bernie's lead and have a big fear The Hairball and want to convince us all to vote for Killary.

It also a site where people can and do advocate for political candidates and of course partisan politics are a topic here as it's a crazy ass election cycle. Maybe if you did come here more often you would find that tolerating diverse views and open discussions on issues and policy and news is more conducive to democratic political or non political solutions for what's happening then vilifying and casting everybody who doesn't share your view, pro or con, as a troll, shill or secret agent from the true evil side. If that's not your cup of tea so be it.

I find I learn a lot from uncensored free discussion and hearing what other people here have to say. It tempers my hot head and opens my mind to other paths then the current by-partisan circus fueled by fear and propaganda. It's very nice not to have the thought police patrolling the site for unity and 'trolls' who deviate from the group think.

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Borkrom's picture

I could not agree with you more- at least for now Smile

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bunch of hillary sycophants.

to each her/his own...

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lunachickie's picture

was when this place was offline...

Shills are inevitable on any blog. I kind of like how they get handled here, for the most part. I don't see the interactions with them as "attempts to educate" --at least, the ones I've seen were flat-out warnings to get their shit together or else. Looks to me like the "or else" thing was carried out many times already, too. To me, that's a good thing. Seems to me that's the admins saying "if you're going to post garbage, don't expect a captive, docile audience to greet it". And it also seems to me that the vast majority of us are pretty quick to spot it accurately.

I don't know about you, but that keeps me on my toes. Sure, they piss me off too, but there seems to be an upside of knowing in advance what bullshit they're spouting or are going to spout. I always thought of DK as "Trial Balloon Central"--they get tested out over there, IMO, and if they fly there, they are launched on MSM. Nothing wrong with having a little advance recon...

Wink

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one that you can prove is a shill and not just a person who doesn't have the same viewpoint as yourself. At Daily Kos anyone who had differing viewpoints were labelled trolls, here it seems the label is "shills".

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