A simple "professional left" test:

[boppers]

1. Do you have a website/TV show/youtube channel/radio show that creates additional revenue when you attract traffic by saying outlandish things?
2. Do you charge to speak on radio or camera?
3. Are you certain your personal opinion is the correct one?
4. If you do not receive revenue for your media efforts, do you receive an ego boost, community "points", or other forms of social compensation?

[Ken Burch]

1. Why is point #4 in there?

That one basically implies you're part of the PL if anyone agrees with you or praises anything you say.

[gkhouston]

3. Good point. Pretty much all of DU would be excluded by virtue of rule 4.

:rofl:

[boppers]

5. Do you post to DU for personal emotional gain?

I think I might have discovered/realized something about the social dynamic here....

[gkhouston]

6. Yeah, I'm thinking "antisocial" and "static" might be better adjectives for DU. n/t

[boppers]

4. That's in there for "dogpile" and (to some extent) "astro-turfing" reasons.

The compensation is not always directly monetary, but it's still a form of professional compensation.

I disagree with your assertion that "you're part of the PL if anyone agrees with you or praises anything you say", perhaps a better way of saying it would be "you're part of the PL if you post something in hopes that anyone agrees with you or praises anything you say".

Basically, it's about personal motivation.

[Ken Burch]

7. Actually, point #4 would be more like "Emotionally-Needy Left"

And I doubt that many people here post primarily for self-validation. Most are driven by a sincere concern with contributing to the solutions of this country's and this world's problems.

[boppers]

9. Is there evidence that such a thing has happened?

Have there been cases where a post to DU had the direct effect of:
"contributing to the solutions of this country's and this world's problems"

That would be totally cool, but I personally haven't seen any examples where such a thing has happened.

[Ken Burch]

11. I have no way of knowing that, or of proving it.

The intent is there, though. And that is what I was talking about, the intent to help make life better.

[canetoad]

10. I'm glad you brought that up Ken

Not because I think there is substance in your comments but because the 'emotionally needy' drive much of our internet communications.

The need for validation, the need for approval, the need to feel 'belonging' to a group. You're a smart boy and you know what motivates people. It doesn't matter if the emotionally needy are on the left or right of politics; they approach internet posting in a similar manner.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

13. I burst out laughing when I read that...

While your innocence and naivete are touching, I fear that a touch of cynicism would serve you better. I'm sure lots of DUers would claim their motivations are the ones you suggest, and some of them probably even believe it, but that doesn't mean it's true.

[Hannah Bell]

15. excepting yourself, of course.

[boppers]

17. There was no irony injured in this post.

I had a committee make sure of it.

[boppers]

16. Sometimes only a child can tell adults that "the emperor has no clothes"

Of course, other times the child can exclaim that:
"The Emperor is a rainbow pancake pony!"

...which takes more time to understand.

[Chulanowa]

18. I would strongly disagree

I get the impression a large number of posters are in it only for the social validation of feeling "hip." I've seen an awful lot of outrage, but precious little concern, and almost no action. This place seems more and more like an echo chamber where people compete to see who can be the loudest while proclaiming their ideological purity and ranting and raving about anyone who's not as "Progressive" in rhetoric as they are.

[Goldstein1984]

2. No, but I'd like to.

[TheKentuckian]

8. Then who the fuck is he possibly talking about?

Why is having emotional arguments with shadows?

He said it was because of cable TV but that is clearly false or he's a thin skinned sucker. Nobody on cable says that in anything like Obama is the same as Bush in any global sense and virtually no one even on a forum even calls for the Pentagon to be dismantled, I mean NOBODY

[emsimon33]

12. Actually, Jon Stewart has drawn a parallel a time or two

and an accurate one at that.

[boppers]

14. Carrville not enough for you?

How about Amy Goodman?

[TheKentuckian]

22. A six figure super talking head doing an interview with a DC paper is so put out by those two?

that he must address them and do some real pushback? Particularly after Skeletor had apologized?

Amy Goodman (who was probably accurate in specific contrasts) who like 90% or more of the country has never seen or heard of?

I call bullshit these aren't close to 300 million people scope discussions. Is the administration so thin skinned that they must publicly lash out at shadows?

All the shit going on and were are supposed to believe the administration is chasing down fucking a stray podcast to give them a piece of their mind?

The Tooth Fairy is more plausible and if by some stretch of the fabric of the Universe it is true then we need to be rid of silly, petty, and petulant pre-teens rather than cheering their lame spitballs to nearly non-existent quarters.

[Fumesucker]

19. #5 Do you think a Canadian style single payer would be better than mandated private insurance?

#6 Do you want the US out of Afghanistan and Iraq?

[Warren Stupidity]

20. The smear was an effort to deny the validity of the discontent on the left

as the work of "professionals" rather than actual discontent.

[Sinistrous]

21. Not realy.

Mostly just the "Obama = Bush" claque.

[Warren Stupidity]

23. or people who want canadian style healthcare,

or wouldn't be satisfied even if a real Democrat were president.

And misrepresenting "obama is like bush" as "obama is the same as bush" is dishonest.

And the word is 'clique'.

When you are smearing people with your brush, do try to use the right word, unless you meant "professional applauders", in which case I salute your vocabulary but suggest there is a different faction here for whom that label is more apt.

[Sinistrous]

24. clack:

loud confused noise (as of many people). Loud, importunate, or foolish talk.

[Warren Stupidity]

25. You must be part of that claque = clack clique.

let me guess, you are arguing now that you misspelled clack?

[Sinistrous]

26. You aren't reading with a whole lot of comprehension, today, eh?

[inna]

27. what garbage. good thing it's already unrec'd.