You're not less bigoted...

...if it's directed at Republicans

I hate how people on the left make fun of Republicans.

I don’t hate THAT they’re making fun of them, I hate HOW.

There are so many ways to show your disdain for what Republicans do and how they approach the world, so why is it so common to see jokes about their health, accent or physical appearance.

Mitch McConnell is a pretty horrible man. He set us back in so many ways. But the fact that he had a stroke, live on TV? That’s not something to make fun of. Imagine if that was Bernie instead. Would you make fun of him for that?

Or, yeah sure there are a lot of blonde women who are Republicans, but do you want every blonde woman on the left to feel insecure and unwelcome because they have the same hair?

Or, yes, Republican women use a lot of lip filler, but so do many Democrats. We want EVERYONE to feel welcome who has our same values, not just people who don’t “look Republican.”

And then there’s sound. The idea that anyone with a Southern accent must be MAGA. It’s pervasive. A Republican with a Southern accent says something fucked up, and the first reaction is “well I knew it would be just cause of their accent.”

What the fuck!

It reminds me of how at least a few times a month I get a comment saying “well, with that nose I wouldn’t expect anything else.” It’s an antisemitic joke, and it’s the literal idea that because my nose is the shape it is, obviously I’m a Democrat, because most Jews are. Obviously I’m talking about the economy, because Jews control money. Obviously I care about global politics, because Jews control the world.

There are people on the left of all shapes, sizes, accents and religions. People who have every single kind of style under the sun and hair color and augmentation. There are people who are disabled in every single kind of way, from physical to learning disabilities. And, the most pervasive of the jokes, there are people on the left who are illiterate.

Even if there weren’t, even if we were as homogeneous as Republicans, these are STILL not things to make fun of someone for.

Part of being a Democrat is caring and being compassionate. And the kind of jokes I see about Republicans every day is not that.

It’s not cause they don’t deserve to be made fun of, they fucking do, but be more creative and intelligent about it.

Talk about their policies, or lack thereof. Talk about their confusion over basic things and their inability to ever tell the truth. Talk about their weird obsession with Trump. There are so many things to talk about without it being about their appearance or how they speak.

And whenever you’re not sure, think, “if this was flipped, how would I feel?” “If they said this about Kamala, or AOC or Mamdani or Chris Murphy, or me?”

The way we speak matters.

You never know who you could be convincing doesn’t belong in community with us when you use these words.

And we need that diversity. We don’t want homogeneity. We want unique and creative people who fit every single possible appearance description, who speak every language and has every possible accent imaginable, who are every size and race and ethnicity, who can read and who can’t, we want them ALL to feel safe in our space.

If they don’t, then are we really Democrats at all?