I had to block a lifelong friend because of abusive emails
This post is relevant to the Bernie Sanders campaign, including what happened in Nevada and its aftermath. As I read about people receiving threats and abusive emails, texts, and phone calls from people who support Bernie Sanders for president, it matches my personal experience with a lifelong friend who became so personally abusive of me, I had to block his emails a few weeks ago.
My friend supports Bernie Sanders for president. He has decided that Hillary Clinton is a horrible person. He has decided that I am a horrible person because I said - in one very brief email response to him about a month ago - that I voted for Hillary in my state's primary. The second sentence of my two-sentence email stated that I would gladly vote for Bernie Sanders if he is the nominee.
Ever since then, I have received a barrage of abusive emails every day. These emails contain obscenities and abuse directed at me, Hillary Clinton, women in general, people of color, gay people, and immigrants from Mexico. My friend considers himself to be super-liberal. I have known him since we were three years old. We grew up together. I still exchange Christmas cards with his parents. The entire family considers themselves to be ultra-liberal. I am certain that his parents and sister would be shocked and appalled by the emails he has sent me.
I stopped reading them and simply skimmed the subject lines. Even that became too much. A few weeks ago I blocked his emails. They now go directly to my spam filter.
My old friend is an alcoholic, prone to drunken emails. I know this about him. It's why he doesn't have my phone number or physical address. For years and years the drunken email outbursts have been manageable. He'll send a half dozen or so during a binge, apologize when he sobers up, and then everything's fine for weeks or months.
This is different. It's almost as if he has gone insane. His emails are horrible, racist, misogynistic, homophobic screeds. They include personal insults against me and my family, including people who have been deceased for decades. There are no apologies during the sober spells - simply mumbled emails that say he didn't really mean some of the worst things, but, etc. etc.
I believe that my friend's behavior is part of a national phenomenon. Somehow, a certain number of people of identify as Bernie Sanders supporters have gone completely around the bend. I am in the fifth decade of my life and I have never seen anything like this, not in any other political campaign.
Are other people experiencing similar experiences?
= new reply since forum marked as read
This must be so hard to deal with. 
But I haven't understood it from "liberals" during this president's terms either. 
--imm
I know.... really! 
"My old friend is an alcoholic, prone to drunken emails. I know this about him. It's why he doesn't have my phone number or physical address."
This is Sanders' fault?
sorry for the hijack, but this could take on a life of its own...
He sounds incredibly troubled. Politics and religion can push people who are unstable to begin with right over the edge. High octane campaigns with an all-or-nothing narrative heighten the sense of urgency in people who are already investing too much of their self worth and "survival" on a particular candidate. Both Trump and Bernie have tapped into their supporter's rage and fear and that is enough for it to be the tipping point for some.
One of the more bizarre aspects of some of the "true believers" on both sides is that unlike those for whom the consequence of the election may be a life or death result, many of the most unhinged from Trump and Bernie are not at risk at all. That said, none of my many Bernie and even a few Trump (!) supporting friends would ever think to be rude to me and vice versa. We are extremely respectful of each other's views and demand nothing. I would never denigrate their candidate or their choice and they extend me the same courtesy. The only hostility I have encountered is online and I pretty much avoid it whenever possible.
I'm really sorry you are on the receiving end of what sounds like your friend's insanity and abuse. I'm glad you are sending his emails to spam. You don't deserve that.
reasons is now trying to compare what happened in Nevada to the Black Lives Matter and Ferguson protests.
I'd be shocked by the unchecked stupidity and racial cluelessness of that post and the idiocy of those high fiving it if any of the people posting that shit or celebrating it were a surprise. You use the word "disconnect" to describe these people, I have a much more profane though far more accurate one to describe them.
Who thinks that way? Who doesn't realize that minimizing those issues was fucking stupid? Way too many people here. And I am not impressed by or inclined to listen to any of them.
Exactly. We've all watched as minority and women's issues were either co-opted or dismissed. And astonishingly, both were often times done by the same damned people. 
Which is why most of these people just sit in threads high fiving each other's stupidity with nary a clue that the folks who are most positioned to agree or disagree aren't even willing to give them enough of the time of day to do either. When they and their candidate are finally gone, it will be a blessing. A genuine blessing.
Sending them directly to the trash bin / spam folder is the best option.
Ignore his tantrums (whether literally, by not ever seeing them ... or figuratively, by not responding to the ones you do see) will allow the flame to burn itself out.
