EPISODE 33: BERNIE BROS
Dylan: Do you still think that Bernie stans are pieces of shit?
Steph: No. (Laughter.)
Dylan: Okay.
Steph: No, I think that there are certain individuals who probably need to cool it, but calling people pieces of shit is not a fair assessment.
[Instrumental of ‘These Dark Times’ by Caged Animals begins to play.]
Dylan [VOICEOVER INTRODUCTION]: Hey. I'm Dylan Marron and welcome back to Conversations with People Who Hate Me, the show where I take contentious online disagreements and move them onto a phone call. Sometimes I speak solo to my own detractors and other times I moderate between guests. Today I'm doing the latter.
Now, if you've been at all keeping up even casually with American political news, you'll know that there's a Democratic presidential primary going on. Two of the front-runners are Elizabeth Warren, a senator from Massachusetts, and Bernie Sanders, a senator from Vermont. Both candidates run on largely progressive, left-leaning promises and from the outside, they seem pretty similar.
Now, if you don't live in the United States or you do and you're listening to this in the near or distant future, but the relentless news cycle has completely washed away your memory of this time, that's okay because this story is, unfortunately, timeless and universal: two politically similar candidates run against each other and their competition plays out more fiercely among their respective supporters. This, of course, translates into online fights, vicious verbal exchanges between people who are nearly ideologically identical to each other.
From afar, I get it. This can be very confusing. But this show is all about getting closer, taking a big story and zooming in to just two people who, as always, can only speak for themselves. Today, I'm moderating a call between a Warren supporter and a Bernie supporter who got into a heated altercation on Twitter. Kate Willett is a stand-up comedian, who has a political feminist comedy podcast called Reply Guys. These days she's a vocal Bernie supporter and uses her platform to make political jokes, many in support of her candidate of choice and some against his opponents like this one.
Back in November, Kate tweeted: "I relate to Elizabeth Warren because when I say I have a plan for that, I also mean that I will think about doing it in three years." This tweet really took off and as of this recording, it has 22,000 likes and 2.8 thousand retweets. But someone who didn't like it, both literally and emotionally, is Steph, a woman who, as you'll soon hear, was actually a long-time fan and follower of Kate's. Steph responded, "Ugh, why is it that Bernie stans can't stop themselves from being pieces of shit?"
It then got messier. Kate retweeted Steph's tweet and because Kate has a large following, a lot of people responded and then those people started going through Steph's timeline and responded to older tweets of hers. You know the story. But Kate and Steph are here on this show today. It's easy to look at a conflict, especially one that involves two people who share so many core values, and just assume that everyone is overreacting.
Maybe you are a left-leaning progressive who is tuning in because you've gotten into one of these fights yourself.
Or maybe you hate these fights, can't imagine who is behind it and you've come here to figure that out.
Perhaps you're a conservative listener and you are just so eager to hear more proof of the, quote/unquote, "Left tearing itself apart."
Whatever brought you to this episode today, welcome. We're happy to have you. If this show has taught us anything, it's that there's always a story hidden somewhere beneath the surface of online vitriol, and it's this show's job to find it.
First I'm going to get to know Kate, then Steph, and then I'll connect them to each other. Before we begin, a quick content warning. In today's episode, there is a mention of suicide. If that's not something you should be hearing right now, don't worry. Turn this podcast off and go have a great day. All right? With that being said, let's get started. Here is Kate.
[Music fades. Conversation begins.]
Dylan: Shall we jump right into it?
Kate: Yeah, let's do it.
Dylan: Okay. Kate, hi.
Kate: Hi.
Dylan: How are you?
Kate: Good. How are you?
Dylan: Good. We're doing a podcast.
Kate: I know. I'm so excited.
Dylan: Let's kind of make this more personal for a moment. Tell me about you.
Kate: Okay. I'm a stand-up comedian. I'm a feminist.
Dylan: When did you start honing your comedy voice?
Kate: It's funny. I think when I started comedy I was writing a lot about like sleeping with crappy guys, which was the problem that I was having at the time.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: It was ... Can I be gross on this podcast?
Dylan: Please. Be very gross.
Kate: Yeah. I mean, there was a time in my life where the truly worst thing in my life was that there were some bad people who had cool dicks and I was so upset about this. It was-
Dylan: Bad people with cool dicks.
Kate: I was really, really, really upset.
Dylan: This is amazing.
Kate: But I think now I just, I do feel the injustice of what's happening in our society right now, because I just had a very direct and crushing experience of it.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: So I think a lot of it is coming out in my joke writing. But I actually want to, I want to write jokes about all kinds of things. I think my stand-up is a little bit less political than my Twitter. I guess one of the reasons why I feel compelled to tweet about Bernie a lot is because I do think that there is this stereotype of the Bernie Bro that seems to be incredibly persistent.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: So I like to tweet jokes about Bernie that have a feminist take.
Dylan: Yeah. Yeah.
Kate: I mean, I don't know how many people still believe in the Bernie Bro thing, but I feel like it's important to kind of get the perspective out there that there's some feminist reasons for supporting Bernie.
Dylan: Completely.
Kate: Of course, I also just like writing jokes.
Dylan: Yeah. You tweeted, and I think this was in November, right?
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: You tweeted: "I relate to Elizabeth Warren because when I say I have a plan for that, it also means I'll think about doing it in three years."
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: So what inspired you to tweet that?
Kate: I remember she released her Medicare for All plan.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: And I was mad that she wanted to pursue a public option before she pursued Medicare for All, so I was feeling the fire and I tweeted the joke about that. Also that I was procrastinating on writing some stuff-
Dylan: Right. Yes. A noble thing. Mm-hmm (affirmative). I get it.
Kate: ... that I needed to be writing at the same time. So, yeah, I feel like a lot of my political jokes are a mixture of things that are going on for me internally and how I project them onto other political situations or candidates.
Dylan: No, listen. I think you just nailed humanity.
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: And how politics works.
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: So, mm-hmm (affirmative), you're not alone. But you can make a joke at her expense.
Kate: Yeah. But, I mean, to me it felt like a betrayal, like all right, well, she's not serious about pursuing this.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: Or it's not at the forefront of her priorities, at least.
Dylan: So this tweet got very popular.
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: It blew up. Many of your tweets do, not to brag. I'm with a Twitter celeb.
Kate: Yeah, I just ...
Dylan: So this tweet blew up. You got a lot of responses to it.
Kate: Yes, I did.
Dylan: Of the many comments under that tweet, there was one woman named Steph who tweeted, "Ugh, why is it that Bernie stans can't stop themselves from being pieces of shit?" How did you feel when you read that?
Kate: I felt like it was a little over the top. It was a mixture of like I was mad, but then I was also kind of ... It felt unfair to me, because my joke was about Elizabeth Warren procrastinating. It was not a-
Dylan: And which, to be fair, was something you identified with.
Kate: Yes, exactly.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: And it was like I try to put some care into my jokes, even if I am making fun of Warren or something, to make sure that it's not misogynistic. It just-
Dylan: And you're like, procrastinating can be done by all.
Kate: Exactly. Yeah.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: Procrastination for all. For all, yeah. (Laughs)
Dylan: Yeah, that's a great platform to run on.
Kate: Yeah. So I don't know. It just felt like it wasn't quite the type of joke that would warrant being called a "piece of shit." I wasn't anti-Warren or anything.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: I voted for Bernie in '16, but I didn't really like him very much. I also was, like a lot of people online, I was kind of put off by all the yelling and then I got a socialist boyfriend in 2018.
Dylan: I like that it's just you procured it.
Kate: No, yeah. I mean, well, actually what happened was I had a fight with this random other comic on the internet. He tweeted something about Hillary Clinton and I thought it was pretty sexist, so it really escalates. It goes into the DMs and we are like, "We're never talking again."
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: So after that, one of his friends reached out to me, who was another comic I knew from around.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: And that guy, Raghav, we really hit it off and ended up dating.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: Which I thought was really funny. I guess he wanted someone to debate with or whatever. So we fell super in love and then about six months into our relationship, he got pretty severe depression, which was something that he had struggled with for a while.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: He got just really down. He couldn't go to the doctor to get medicine or anything like that because he wasn't insured; he didn't have the money. And then he died from his depression.
Dylan: Oh.
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: My, god.
Kate: Yeah, it's incredibly fucked up. It's one of the most fucked up, perhaps the most fucked up thing that's ever happened.
Dylan: Oh, wow.
Kate: Seeing just the ways that our society failed him. And just I feel like in this situation, it's impossible to say that the definitive reason that he died from depression was because he couldn't go to the doctor, but I know that when he was able to medicate his depression at a time when he did have access to medicine, it was ... I don't know. He was just able to function a lot better. And he had some serious mental illness, and I do truly believe that he would be alive today if we had Medicare for All.
Dylan: That moment with your boyfriend was what sparked the fire for you, right?
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: Absolutely. I mean, I think by the time I dated him in 2018, I was no longer against Bernie, but I couldn't have seen myself becoming a passionate Bernie supporter.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: So after he died, I became really good friends with a lot of his friends and I feel like a big way that we have been just handling Raghav's death is to be very active in trying to get Bernie elected, because we really believe in Medicare for All.
Dylan: Mmm.
Kate: I think all of us feel like we just want to make sure that what happened to someone we really love doesn't happen to other people's friends, family. It doesn't feel political anymore for me. It feels very real.
Dylan: So you're about to talk to Steph. How are you feeling about that?
Kate: It feels a little nerve-wracking to talk to someone who I know may not like me or may have a lot of ideas about what I'm like or something.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: But I don't know. I guess I feel like a little bit optimistic that I know she said in her bio that she was a feminist. My hope is that maybe if she finds out that I'm also a feminist and that we care about many of the same issues, that maybe she would feel less mad at me. I don't know.
[Solo conversation ends. Phone rings. Second guest picks up.]
Steph: Hello?
Dylan: Hey. How are you?
Steph: Well, I just woke up like four minutes before you called.
Dylan: Okay. Yes. Welcome to the day.
Steph: Thank you. I set an alarm, and I did not hear it in any way.
Dylan: Listen, that's how it goes.
Steph: I stayed up too late last night watching TV.
Dylan: Love that you have just woken up this morning, and we welcome you to the day. So Steph, let's start here. Now, it feels like performed I ask this so much, but I'll try to make it fresh. Steph, in only as many details as you want to share with me and on this show, why don't you tell me about you? Your life, your daily life, how you would describe yourself. Kind of take that question however you want to take it.
Steph: Okay. My name is Steph. I am 29. I live in the Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania. I am a feminist.
Dylan: Yes.
Steph: And I am a writer. My day job allows me to be an artist as well.
Dylan: Incredible.
Steph: I watch too much TV. In general, I wear many hats. None of them are literal hats because my head doesn't look good in them.
Dylan: (Laughs) Good!
Steph: But ...
Dylan: Good to know.
Steph: Yeah, I know. I think that covers the ...
Dylan: The gist.
Steph: The important bases, yeah.
Dylan: And you would call yourself a Warren supporter.
Steph: Yeah. I am, yes. I voted for Bernie-
Dylan: Yeah. As of this recording, subject to change, of course.
Steph: Yes. I am a Warren supporter for most of this year I will ... Okay. This is 2020 now. I forgot. For most of, a lot.
Dylan: Yeah. Well, yeah. But also you can say all of this year so far.
Steph: Yes. In fact, for all of this year.
Dylan: So let's kind of dig into the tweet. At the time that Kate tweeted that, what was your relationship to her?
Steph: I followed Kate soon after I joined Twitter. I joined Twitter for an online journalism class that I was taking. It was a requirement. A lot of what that was was following news organizations, but my sister was on Twitter and she was like, "Oh, hey, follow this person. She's very funny." So she sent me one of her tweets and then I was like, "Oh, hey. It is funny." So I followed her.
Dylan: Confirmed funny. Great.
Steph: Yes. And that was really it. I just followed her. I don't really have a super active Twitter vice. I don't have a following or anything. I'm just a regular person.
Dylan: I'm following you now, so I count myself as part of your following, so don't knock us, please.
Steph: Oh, thank you. Thank you so much. I like to tweet about things that are important to me, but also about TV.
Dylan: Important to do that.
Steph: So that's just how I roll. So that's my Twitter feed, essentially is TV shows and my hot takes about them.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: And political things.
Dylan: Which is what brings us to this beautiful call today. What added me to your wonderful following, what makes me a proud member of your following, is that Kate Willett tweeted, she tweeted a political joke, a jab, if you will. And how does seeing it make you feel?
Steph: What I had personally been dealing with at that time was that for some reason, the algorithms decided that my Twitter was just going to be full of people who were hard-core Bernie supporters. Unfortunately, Kate's tweet was my breaking point.
Dylan: Kate's tweet was your breaking point. Why do you think that was the case?
Steph: A little bit, I think that it's because it's someone that I chose to follow and someone that for however many years I've been on Twitter was enjoying her Twitter presence. Then to have that kind of negativity that I really associate with Bernie supporters be posed in that way really just, it was like the last straw. So ...
Dylan: Yeah. Yeah. So you reach your breaking point and you see this tweet. Then you tweet, "Ugh, why is it that Bernie stans can't stop themselves from being pieces of shit?" So what made you want to vocalize those thoughts on Twitter?
Steph: It's not just about being a Warren follower, what have you, but just about the general future of the Democratic Party and just the political nightmare that we're living. I just don't see it as necessary to tear down in such a way the only other truly progressive candidate. So I was just over it at that point. A lot of the time when I reply to things on Twitter, I feel like it's shouting into the void.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: So when I returned to it and saw that it had created a lot of responses, that was shocking. People then responded to me in an overwhelmingly negative fashion.
Dylan: Yeah. Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: I got ratioed, as it were.
Dylan: Ratioed. Okay. Which to explain to anyone who doesn't know, it means getting more negative comments than likes on a tweet.
Steph: "What?" I was like, "What? I'm just Steph!"
Dylan: Yeah, it's like you're shouting into the void and then sometimes the void reverberates and echoes and then everyone hears it and they're like, "Whoa. I got to say something about that echo I'm hearing."
Steph: Yes.
Dylan: It's funny. You mentioned you're seeing vitriol for a candidate and then you then responded with vitriol. From the outside, it looks like, "Ugh, infighting again." But, of course, you had complicated, nuanced feelings that you were trying to express, wouldn't you say?
Steph: Yes. Yes, very much. And those feelings were of like, "Oh, Bernie supporters are aggressive." And then I said something that was aggressive also. But then the response to that was also aggressive.
Dylan: Also aggressive. Yeah.
Steph: It almost proved my point to myself about Bernie supporters.
Dylan: Yeah, it's one of these challenging, challenging things. We identify the things we don't like and then unwittingly we end up doing that thing that we don't like. Then it just kind of, you're combatting the bad and then you add more bad and then you're like, "Oh, I didn't mean to add more bad, but now the bad is coming at me in a disproportionate way." So it's this very weird place to have a conversation.
Steph: Yeah.
Dylan: What happened after you tweeted that in response? Did you mute the thread? What happened?
Steph: I think I unfollowed her immediately after that, because I was like, "No, I'm not doing this anymore." So a certain level of betrayal almost, I guess.
Dylan: Yeah.
Steph: Because I feel like sometimes you exist in the world and you forget that you can agree with people on so many things and then still disagree on something important.
Dylan: Well, I think that's actually kind of confoundingly who we disagree with the hardest.
Steph: Weirdly, I think of Bernie Sanders as just someone who's just so ... He's got a lot of anger, which is fair, because there are many things to be angry about. I identify with that a lot because I'm always angry. I always have a level of just constant simmering rage that's beneath the surface.
Dylan: Yes.
Steph: It really motivates me in my life, and I identified with that in 2016. I voted for Bernie in the primary in 2016.
Dylan: Okay.
Steph: But Elizabeth Warren presents things in a different way that to me, she just inspires me.
Dylan: You said there's a constant simmering rage just beneath the surface for you. If you even can identify it, what is the source of that simmering rage?
Steph: Like in high school, I would say that was just my persona. Like, "That's Steph. She's angry all the time," as teenagers often are.
Dylan: Oh, yeah.
Steph: It was like a persona that I almost cultivated a little bit, but also actual anger and depression also I didn't realize at the time.
Dylan: Yeah.
Steph: But ...
Dylan: Well, there's always a lot of funny building blocks that go into our personas, right? It's like one, who we're reacting against and also what we are rewarded for. Like in college, I was rewarded in a big way for being the funny, gay kid. So looking back, it's like, whoa, I really was everyone's little clown, you know?
Steph: Yeah.
Dylan: But I'm aware that I did that because I was incentivized to do it. Was there any way that you were kind of incentivized for anger? Maybe from your friends or something else?
Steph: Maybe. I feel like one of my things is that I just don't talk very much in certain group settings. I'm sort of a classic introvert in that sense. But then sometimes when I do say things, I end up being funny and then I get laughter in response. I feel like that could definitely be part of that. It just worked for me in so many ways because I was angry, presenting as angry kept me sort of invisible. Like it just helped me fly under the radar a little bit, but it also was like it would protect me if for some reason my flying-under-the-radar thing didn't work. I just wanted to be smart. I feel like we all do, but yeah, that was... I wanted to be angry and smart and angry because I know things, I guess.
Dylan: Oh, yeah.
Steph: Yeah. And I feel like the apathy is a way that it's like, all right, nothing can bother me, because I just don't care enough for it to bother me.
Dylan: I get that. It's a really good protective shield, because if nothing can bother you enough to care, then no one can hurt you, which is something that I feel, certainly... Or, we all have our shields. I don't think mine is apathy. I think it's perhaps something else. Maybe it's this podcast, which literally started as a coping mechanism to deal with people saying negative things about me. And now here we are, many episodes into it three years down the line, and we all have our strange little coping mechanisms. Um... So you are about to talk to Kate for the first time. How are you feeling?
Steph: I'm excited to... the word that came to mind was "hash things out".
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: But I feel like that's not what this is.
Dylan: This is whatever you want to do. You can hash it out.
[Phone rings. All guests are now connected.]
Kate: Hi.
Steph: Hi.
[BREAK]
Dylan: Kate, how are you feeling about this call?
Kate: All of a sudden I felt very nervous.
Dylan: You feel nervous?
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: Why?
Kate: All of a sudden it set in.
Dylan: When did it set in? When the call rang?
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: Well, don't be nervous. This is a great and loving place. Steph, how are you feeling?
Steph: Good and fine, I guess.
Dylan: Are you part of the nervous train? We welcome it. I'll join on too, now that Kate brought it up.
Steph: Yeah, sure. (Laughter)
Dylan: Okay. Okay. Before we kind of get into it, I would love for you to get to know each other. So Kate, why don't you kick it off and tell Steph a little about you, what she might not know?
Kate: Okay. I'm a stand-up comic but that's ...
Dylan [VOICEOVER]: In this part of the call, Kate and Steph get to know each other. But to avoid repetition since you've just heard this stuff, I'm going to speed you up to the part where they start talking about finances. Here's Kate.
Kate: I'm trying to think. I don't have a lot of money. I am somebody who ... I mean, I'm not super poor, but I'm definitely not doing amazing, economically. I, for sure, have struggles in that way right now. Hopefully, not forever, but being a stand-up comic is not necessarily a lucrative profession, even if you've been on TV a lot of times. I mean, I just did Colbert. I have a special on Netflix, and it's still kind of hard to make a living in comedy. You know, things are coming along ...
Steph: I also don't have a lot of money, and currently I am staying at my mom's house, because I tried to live on my own in an apartment and I couldn't afford it.
Dylan: Yeah.
Steph: So for the next few months, I will be sleeping in the living room. But I do have prospects to get out of here, so that's exciting.
Kate: As someone who has slept on many couches, I stan a couch-sleeping queen.
Dylan: Yes. Steph, a couch-sleeping queen.
Steph: The couch is actually super uncomfortable, so I sleep in a recliner.
Kate: Oh, good.
Dylan: Oh, okay. Well, this is good.
Steph: And I am safe and warm and stuff. So I can't complain too much.
Dylan: Safe and warm, love. So let's get down to this lovely Twitter experience we're here to talk about. Kate, you shared with Steph a little earlier about what really activated you to Bernie--a boyfriend who you believe would ... or not you believe, who would still be alive today if he had access.
Kate: Yeah. I mean, he struggled with depression for a long time, and I believe that if he had been able to medicate his depression, he'd still be here.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: I mean, it would be impossible to make a definitive claim that he absolutely still would.
Dylan: Totally. I get it.
Kate: But I can say when he was on the medicine that was working for him and he access to the doctor, he was doing a lot better than he was at the end of his life.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: Yeah, I mean, man, I don't know. I feel that there's no other candidate that's running that shares my values as much as Bernie does, specifically on Medicare for All. I feel like even though there's other people that do support universal healthcare, he feels the most committed to Medicare for All and that's the most important issue to me.
Steph: Universal healthcare is also very important to me. I lived without health insurance for, I think six years. I was able to get health insurance again through ACA when the marketplaces first opened. I was able to get an amazing plan that was very affordable and then, of course, the next year I was able to get a plan that was less affordable. Then there was nothing. Fortunately, I was able to get healthcare through my job, because I have a number of health issues that I've had that I have had to seek treatment for, including mental health issues. I actually wanted to ask, and I don't know, Kate, if you would be ... You don't have to answer, but the person that you were talking about, was it a suicide?
Kate: No, I don't think so. He was talking about suicide a lot around the time that he died. But I think to medicate his depression, he kind of turned to alcohol and was drinking a lot in the last couple weeks of his life, and one night he drank too much and I think that's how he died. That's the information that I have. I mean, I don't actually know 100% for sure, because that was what his family passed along. But I just, yeah, I don't know for sure. It's not like I talked to the doctor myself or something like that. Yeah, I think that there's something about Bernie's anger that resonates with me now, actually. When I used to see him yell in 2016, I felt like, "Oh, my god. Why is this guy so mad?" But then now that I've had this really terrible thing happen, I feel like he is actually yelling on my behalf, like he's yelling because I can't yell. I mean, I can a little bit, like on Twitter or something. But his anger is like it's anger on my behalf now. I can't help but thinking that that's how a lot of people feel about him.
Steph: Yeah. That's something that used to resonate with me with Bernie. I am inherently just an angry person. I just carry a lot of anger around with me every day. Now, one of the reasons possibly that I switched my preferred candidates from Bernie to Warren is that I felt like it's possible that there's something more productive than that righteous anger. I think that that might be Elizabeth Warren's approach.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: The other thing is that, as you said, obviously it's not directed at me specifically, but I just kept seeing those takes about how people who don't support Bernie are people who aren't poor or people who don't care about healthcare or people who whatever. And I was like, "But I am poor, I do care about healthcare." So those felt like, I guess, misguided attacks. It just, it seemed like that was where the divisiveness was coming from, was coming from that side.
Kate: I think the part of the reason I got mad at you is because I'm tired of being told that Bernie supporters are especially bad or something. I can certainly empathize with the experience of bad online supporters, and I really used to think that Bernie's supporters were particularly bad. Like in 2016, I had a lot of Bernie Bro jokes and I actually regret those jokes now, because I get yelled at by supporters of other candidates all the time. So I've really started to think that people are just mean on the internet, especially to women, and that it has nothing to do with the supporters of any particular candidate. I just think that people are jerks online a lot of the time. I don't know. So I think when I saw you say that to me, there was a righteous response on my end of it too, which is like, "Hey, look. Bernie people are not the only folks calling people names on this internet. Everybody is actually being bad to each other." You know?
Dylan: And you responded to Steph's tweet.
Kate: Yeah, I did. I don't remember what exactly I said, but I think I tweeted it and I said like, "I like Elizabeth Warren but her supporters are bad," or something. I don't remember exactly what I said, but, I mean, I was kind of being really snarky about it. I actually do regret that, because it's like I don't want to get in fights with people online or whatever. But I think it was just all day I was being told that I was bad for supporting Bernie, because Bernie supporters are harassing bros. And I was being told this by people who were being mean to me. So it just started to feel like a very pot-kettle situation, and then I got righteously indignant about it. Yeah.
Steph: Yeah. So obviously, I shouldn't have said what I said either. I feel like that's just ... It's so obvious. It was an outsized response to what you had said. When I had one of my friends look at the exchange without providing context for it, she was like, "What the fuck, Steph? That's not an appropriate response at all." I was like, "Oh, you are correct. Sorry." I was like, "Oh, no. You're right, you're right." So this is the problem is that context is so important, but the internet does not provide it. I also never expected you personally to really get or notice it, just because of the, I feel like the volume of responses that were there. And furthermore, I definitely never expected for people to respond to me, which is what happened. A lot of people commented to my reply and then those same people also went into my timeline or to my Twitter feed.
Dylan: Feed.
Steph: Whatever the terminology is. Then responded to other posts that I had made. I was like, "What? Get out of here. What are you doing?"
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: I totally get that and I shouldn't have responded to you. I didn't really think that through. I'm not actually used to having a large Twitter following, and I don't want things like that to happen. I don't like it. So I'm not going to quote tweet someone ever again unless it's somebody else who has kind of put themself out there as a public person already, like a journalist or whatever.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: Or perhaps if it's like a really sexist guy saying awful shit to women, then whatever. I don't care.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: Yeah.
Kate: But yeah, I don't like that that happened, and I definitely learned from the experience that I can't at this point fight people on Twitter without expecting that some third parties will get involved. I used to be able to, but at this point, that would be not kind or responsible. So I'm sorry about that.
Steph: Thank you. Yeah, I mean, I also will be more careful about what I'm saying, because that's my thing. I really use Twitter as like a shouting-into-the-void kind of thing. But it's like, oh, it's not the void. There are people in there. So ...
Dylan: Yeah, then the void shouts back. So ...
Steph: Exactly. And the void has human emotions also, as it turns out.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Mm-hmm.
Steph: So I guess it's not...
Dylan: Well, the void is weirdly populated by humans. That's the weird thing about social media.
Kate: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, and it's like, I don't know, man. Because I've had times during this election season where I feel like I am being constructive and stuff. And then I've also had times where I've just been shitty. Like I'm grieving someone that I really love and I miss him and I don't know, man. I have really strong feelings about this stuff. Every once in a while, I have looked at my Twitter and been like, "Ah, Kate, you can not...". There have been times when I'm like, "No, it's not constructive for me to get mad online. I'm adding to something that I don't think will help anything." But at the same time, this feels like the biggest deal to me in the world right now.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: Is making sure that everyone gets healthcare, especially. You know?
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: I've put a lot of my feelings about missing Raghav into this and I just, I don't know. I'm not going to say that 100% of everything I've ever said has been from the most rational place in the world.
Steph: Yeah.
Dylan: Steph, is there a way that you process pain online?
Steph: Rather than ... I just, I want to go off on a slightly different thing, because I just feel like now's the time.
Dylan: Yeah.
Steph: One of the reasons why it's like I swear healthcare is important to me is that when I was 16, my dad died. And with whatever money there was in the aftermath of that from, I don't know, his pension. I don't even know what money that was exactly.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: My mom had to use that money, a very large portion of it, to secure health insurance for herself and for me for the next couple of years. It was just an obscene amount of money that had to go towards that. So that's one of the reasons why when people say, "If you don't support Bernie, you don't support healthcare," why I'm like, "I assure you that's not the case." But what I wasn't going to mention but now I feel is very relevant to me and Kate understanding each other...
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: Is that my died by suicide.
Dylan: Mmm.
Steph: So I very, very deeply understand the kind of pain that comes from someone not having access to mental health care or not utilizing that. Personally, I think that a lot of it is to do with the way that society treats men and having that be as a result of how society treats women, which is that--"Be a man. Don't deal with your feelings." That is what leads, I think, to the high suicide rate among men.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: Even if that wasn't how the person that you lost died specifically, it sounds like mental health was a huge factor. So I absolutely understand where you're coming from. That was what I've been trying to articulate, really since Kate talked about the fact that it was mental health was a factor.
Kate: Yeah, I'm really sorry to hear about your dad. That's incredibly messed up and I'm so sorry that you had to go through that. And I believe you, that you cared about healthcare. I can see why, especially having been through all of that, it would feel super bad to have people tell you that you don't care about something that actually is really important to you. Yeah, I just ...
Steph: Yes.
Kate: Yeah, and I think it helps me too, to understand that there are Elizabeth Warren supporters that are just for whatever reason don't believe that Bernie Sanders can get the job done or whatever. And that even though I disagree with that assessment, but I think I could be sometimes a little bit more generous in my assumptions about what's motivating people.
Dylan: Yeah, and just to be fair, Kate, I don't think that the internet totally encourages us to be fair in our assessments about what's going on with other people.
Kate: Yeah.
Steph: It really doesn't. I just, yeah. It's funny that you say that because it does suck. It sucks. It just sucks. That's the only phrasing that you can really use. What happened to the person that you lost also sucks and it seems like that is a really recent thing. I know how different it is when it's kind of fresh. It's really hard, because part of me is like I hate people. I just hate people so much in general. I'm like, oh, get away from me. But at the same time, I love humanity and just seeing the humanity in people is so important. And the internet is not a great place for that.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: It can be.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: I think that that is one of the things that's positive about it. But the way that we overwhelmingly interact with a large number of people is that we are not seeing their humanity.
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kate: I agree.
Steph: I think that there are some systems online that are specifically designed so that we don't see people's humanity.
Dylan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steph: And it's a dark world.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: Absolutely.
Dylan: Yeah. What this larger conversation seems to be about is what we do with our anger and how we respond to other people expressing that anger for us. But then there's also this second level of anger, because it's like you are gravitating towards a candidate who expresses anger in the way that is appropriate to you. Right?
Kate: Yeah.
Steph: Yeah.
Dylan: Bernie, to you, Kate, is like he is the right amount of angry for a thing that he deserves to be angry about. And Steph, it seems like you're attracted to the way Elizabeth Warren activates and expresses her anger, would you say?
Steph: Yeah.
Dylan: The interesting thing, though, is that that anger ricochets against each other on the internet.
Kate: Yeah.
Steph: Yeah, definitely. People talk about echo chambers of ideas, but I think that a lot of the time it's an echo chamber of just anger.
Dylan: Yeah.
Steph: Like rage just bouncing around off of the walls.
Kate: Yeah.
Steph: And just getting bigger and scarier.
Dylan: I agree with that. And I wanted to point out something that has been so fascinating as I'm listening to you two talk. Which is like all we are to each other are punching bags.
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: So it's like how do you take your anger at a systemic macro thing out on the system? Well, you can't. You can't take your anger out on a system, so instead, you pick a person who has tweeted a joke about Elizabeth Warren or you pick a person who has tweeted something in response to that joke and then you retweet that person. But it's like that's, I think, the core of this very discussion.
Kate: Yeah.
Steph: Yeah.
Dylan: Steph, were you about to say something?
Steph: No, I was just agreeing.
Dylan: Okay. Great.
Steph: I feel like there's something about the way that I say "yeah" that makes people think I'm going to say stuff.
Dylan: No, no, no. You just took a breath afterward.
Steph: Oh, this happens to me.
Dylan: I actually feel very excited by it. It's like-
Steph: Oh, but this happens to me all the time.
Dylan: No, it's good. It's like yeah, and then I'm thinking and it's like yes, complex mind, go off, queen. If someone were to look at the interaction you two had on Twitter and point to it and say, "See, the Left is doomed," do you think that's a fair read?
Kate: No, because I don't really think that what happens on Twitter or whatever is representative of the coalition-building and the activism that's happening in real life. Most people aren't on Twitter.
Dylan: Steph, do you still think that Bernie stans are pieces of shit?
Steph: No.
Dylan: Okay.
Steph: No. I think that there are certain individuals who probably need to cool it, but calling people pieces of shit is not a fair assessment.
Kate: Are you in any way convinced that there are people who support every candidate who need to cool it?
Steph: Yes, definitely.
Dylan: Yeah.
Steph: Yeah, I wish that there were some way to reconcile the Bernie and Warren thing, because as a coalition, we would be unstoppable, I feel. But I, realistically, in just the way that our political system works, I don't know how we would possibly have that happen.
Kate: Maybe the Left can unite.
Dylan: Maybe the Left can.
Kate: But the bad news is you have to do it, Dylan.
Dylan: Through this show? Every member of the ...
Kate: Yes.
Dylan: Yeah, maybe the Left can unite. We have a lot of work to do. Well, I mean, I have to say I think I do feel like one of those people who does lose a little hope when I see fights like that break out on Twitter and not because I'm casting any judgment on either person. This whole podcast has shown me that everyone has this very nuanced backstory for why they're saying what they're saying, as you both have proven today. But it does make me lose a little hope, but then something like this makes me completely gain it back in this really beautiful way. Do you know what I mean?
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: I just think that, I understand that you could say that Twitter isn't real life. I argue that it is real life, but it's a different prism. It's life through a kind of funhouse mirror. But, I mean, we can at least acknowledge that this conversation that we had today is profoundly different from the one that was had on Twitter.
Kate: Absolutely.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: Yeah.
Steph: Yeah.
Dylan: Yeah. So to wrap things up, are there any final things you want say, either to each other? Or to the void, knowing that the void is populated by humans?
Kate: It's been a pleasure talking to you. Yeah, it's been really illuminating, and I think that I'm going to stop assuming that Elizabeth Warren supporters don't care about healthcare. I think that even though I don't agree that Elizabeth Warren's approach is likely to work, but I also think that I'm probably wrong when I think that Elizabeth Warren supporters are not valuing that issue.
Steph: Yeah. No, this has just been a really good conversation, and I feel like these conversations are what's missing from life, I guess. It's just the idea that we can talk about things and we can understand other people's perspectives and it's not anonymous. As much as the internet is anonymous, it's not really; there's someone back there behind it. There are trolls out there and people who just want to start shit. But I think that that is more rare than it's just people just trying to live their lives and just to keep that in mind as we live our interweb lives. And if you would unblock me on Twitter, then I would follow you again.
Kate: I'll follow you back and I promise I will never quote tweet you again, even if you express that Bernie supporters are pieces of shit.
Dylan: Was there a blocking that happened?
Kate: I think I blocked her. I don't remember. But I will absolutely unblock you.
Dylan: Okay. Unblock.
Kate: It was really good to connect with you. I feel that we agree on more things than not.
Dylan: Yeah.
Kate: I've been thinking recently that I don't want to just make fun of political stuff. I am trying to get back to some good, old-fashioned jokes about men as well. So hopefully, I will have some content that makes you happier.
Dylan: Good.
Kate: Yeah.
Steph: Yes, and I will not say mean things about Bernie or his supporters. I will just tweet about TV and political things.
Dylan: Listen, my goal here is not to eradicate negativity. I think negativity and dissent, its more mature cousin, is very necessary online. So I don't want to eradicate it. I think my only goal is to see what conversations can sprout from it. You know what I mean?
Kate: I think that's a great goal.
Steph: Yeah, I just mean like just mean things. I can still say reasoned arguments are still on the table, but just being mean is probably, you know, is not good.
Dylan: Well, here we are just galloping off into the sunset all together. Well, I just want to say a huge thank you to both of you. I know it takes a lot of energy and some anxiety to come on this show and have these conversations. But I just think this was amazing. So thank you both so much for taking the time to do this.
Kate: Thank you, Dylan.
Steph: Thank you. This has been a really unique and a great experience that I didn't see coming.
Dylan: Listen.
Kate: Same thing. Same thing. Went so much better than I thought it might. It was awesome.
Dylan: Okay. Great. What about for you? Better than you thought, Steph?
Steph: Yeah. Yeah, definitely and more than I ever would've expected from me doing my shouting into the void on Twitter.
Dylan: Like I said.
Steph: It's good to remember that the void is not a void at all.
Dylan: Yeah. Wow. Okay. That is-
Kate: The void is not a void.
Dylan: The void is not a void at all. Oh, honey. Steph, copyright you, babe.
Kate: Yeah.
Dylan: That's incredible. All right. Well, thank you both so much for doing this. And with that, I'll hang up and we'll all see each other on the internet. Sound good?
Kate: Sounds good.
Steph: Sounds good.
Dylan: Bye, Steph.
Steph: Bye.
Kate: Bye.
[Phone call ends with a hang up sound. Instrumental from ‘These Dark Times’ by Caged Animals kicks in.]
Dylan [VOICEOVER CLOSING CREDITS]: If you'd like to be a guest on this show or have an idea for an episode, please visit www.conversationswithpeoplewhohateme.com for more information.
Conversations with People Who Hate Me is a production of Night Vale Presents. Christy Gressman is the executive producer. Vincent Cacchione is the sound engineer and mixer. Emily Newman and Mark Stoll are the associate producers. The theme song is These Dark Times by Caged Animals. The logo was designed by Philip Blackowl with a photo by Mindy Tucker and this podcast was created, produced, and hosted by me, Dylan Marron.
Special thanks to Adam Cecil and our publicist, Megan Larson.
We'll be back in two weeks with a brand new episode. But until then, remember, there's a human on the other side of the screen.
[Chorus of ‘These Dark Times’ by Caged Animals plays.]