Good Bye to the Democratic Underground

[deutsey]

134. "Democratic Underground" originated as a reaction to the stolen 2000 election

I think the "underground" was a reference to the feeling that Democrats and lefties had of being driven underground as everyone else (the Supreme Court, the media, the Congress) all sanctioned what had happened.

As such, it was a nice virtual community for those of us who, despite supporting the candidate who won the majority of the vote, felt marginalized. I joined in early spring of 2001 and that's how it felt to me. I grew up in the '80s and felt very isolated during the Reagan Reaction. DU originally was a great antidote for that feeling under Bush.

There were epic flame wars here and infighting among factions (primaries have always been bad, but there was even a "cool kids vs. nerds" spat in the Lounge at one time). But we always seemed to come together in general in mutual support when we needed to.

That's changed over the past few years, in my opinion. That's not a complaint, it's just an observation. Nothing stays the same and our political realities have changed, so DU had changed along with them. It isn't the community I used to know, but there isn't the same need for one now that we had back then.

I don't know that I'll leave here entirely; I come here now for news and information, for the most part. But DU isn't as important to me as it used to be and with Hillary the presumptive nominee, I won't have much of a place here anyway.

Not sure if I'm voting for Hillary or not. At the moment, I don't believe I will. That could change if I feel it's tight as election day approaches, but if that's the case, it will back to voting against the Republican nominee and not for the Democratic one.