A Tender Heart and a Dedicated Asshole: The Enigma of @berniesanders
When I first got here I quickly became aware of @berniesanders. The election was in full swing, the politician was a well known fellow, and here’s this super strong presence with his fingers all over the blockchain. It didn’t take long for me to realize that many people here found him to be rude, obnoxious, an egomaniac, and completely out of line. He himself says he's a Dedicated Asshole.
The evidence against him
Here’s a gem of a conversation with @stellebella where he flat out calls her a cunt and to get off the platform. (I'm having a hard time finding the original conversation so I'm posting these as a place holder, also please note @berniesanders has many alts on here. @nextgencrypto is one of them.).
Oh, and don’t think anyone is immune. You may have missed this conversation where he takes @ned to task very publicly in the #price channel in Steemit chat. (@ned follows this blog! Hi Ned!)
He’s an unofficial leader in hating on this platform. He uses the abbreviation STINC for Steemit Inc. I’ve heard that sentiment mimicked from many other witnesses in the witness channel. It seems they are frustrated by the lack of GUI improvements on the site, the general performance of the site, and the lack of sales and marketing efforts and people employed by STEEMIT.
I got Flagged
I wrote a post about my own personal experience to the first time I caught a Bernie flag.
I caught mine when I tried to bridge the peace between @gavvet and @berniesanders. @gavvet had a measured response. @berniesanders roughly told me to go fuck myself and @gavvet could too!
Basically it sucked. It hurt my pride. It hurt my wallet. I was mad. But he also had a point and on that day he flagged everyone! It wasn’t personal.
Achievement unlocked
First Conclusion
So, with these kinda fingerprints on the blockchain it looks like he’s a complete fucking asshole and not just a Dedicated one. If you believe that I can understand that. I thought so too.
But then there’s this.
Apparently he’s the world’s biggest STEEMIT hating asshole that’s also willing to donate SBDs to a 15 year old kid to help him go to STEAMFEST. Well, that was probably a fluke right? Here's the full context- https://steemit.com/steemfest/@aggroed/the-autobots-just-collectively-donated-usd333-sbds-to-the-travel-fund-but-theprophet0-still-needs-more-to-get-to-steemfest
Well, you know who is the biggest donor behind the curation trails? You know Engagement? Guess what!?! That’s @berniesanders. All those votes that you’ve gotten with $5-10 at a time came from the world’s biggest asshole…
Lastly, have you had fun with @randowhale yet? Steemit’s cute little "Whale of Fortune." Can you see where I”m going here?!? It’s Bernie’s! He’s tossing out whale votes for your fun, for BTS spite, and for the lulz.
You’ve got Flag
So, that brings me to general flagging. You probably know he’s the most flagrant flagger in Steemit (though Abit might be in for a tie there). You guys might think “WTF are these asshole whales doing running around flagging all this shit brat?” Well,here’s the 411 on that.
Whales that up vote themselves, up vote their alts, and circle jerk their friends hurt the reward pool for the rest of us. These two self appointed police decided against rewardpoolrape and decided to protect us all from it. So, in part because whale curation and voting is so broken right now they decided that HF 18 needed some serious policing, looked around, saw no one and no leadership, but decided that they had enough power and clout to weather it.
I think he honestly just lost his cool and rampaged on this post.
Where’d I land?
The world’s biggest flagging Dedicated Asshole is helping kids, curating the shit out of this place, and protecting us all from whales gaming the system. He’s holding Steemit to task for site slowness and lack of progress on a modern and easy to use GUI. And he’s curating all your minnow posts so you have a chance to grow around here.
I think some people come to the conclusion that he doesn’t give a fuck about anyone or anything… I have the opposite opinion. I think he’s incredibly passionate about this place and holds it to ridiculously high standards and then rages when humanity fails him.
It’s a thankless job, and this post is to say thanks. These guys deserve a medal, but all I can do is give him a badge made by @elyaque to hopefully keep him in the Steemit history books.
PS
All that said. I’m pretty sure he’s an asshole, but don't tell him I said that because he upvoted my Witness yesterday. I fuckin' love this place!
talkin' about Bernie is so hawt right meow
Please vote for me for Witness!
You can find me hanging out on steemspeak, a discord channel that many steemers use to text and talk to each other- https://discord.gg/qjpRj7w
You can find me in Whaleshares- https://discord.gg/GykFB6S
or my new channel PALnet- https://discord.gg/HYj4yvw
I can also be found on steemchat as @aggroed. If you have a post to share give me a good sentence or two of why you think I’ll like it.
To vote for me click the link underneath my profile, scroll under the list of 50 names and type aggroed into the box. If you can see my name you have voted for me (don't click the little blue upvote next to my name as you'll cancel your vote for me).
Not a big fan of using the "C" word.
I'm proud to say I never heard my father use it or my 20 year old son use it and I've never used it. Guess we are too old school.
Thanks for make a light to understand all the characters of here. I think all can be made with modals, but in any case, everyone has his way of doing the work. Excellent post @aggroed.
I actually think its kind of cool to have so many varied personalities. It's what makes a good story (above, enjoyed reading that). It's what gives life flare! You wouldn't want to come here and be bored, right? LOL
Thanks boss.
That is one of the most funny and heart melting love letters I have ever seen – well done – great you show love on a public platform, not everyone would do this my friend. May your love never end lol.
This was so fun and interesting to read. I'm learning little by little of the history of steemit and @berniesanders is such an essential part of that. His recent gestures that you menrioned are sweet and thoughtful, good to know he's got the best interests of minnows like us at heart.
He's gotten more rewards to all the minnows than just about eveeryone else combined I'd guess.
That's a very interesting stat, thank for sharing that!
Outside of the Steemit.com user interface there are no flags. They are downvotes. Just a reminder.
Aside from the usual controversies though, I'm very happy to hear witnesses are frustrated with the UI developement pace of Steemit.
The entire network would do a whole lot better if we could just have a site that looked a tiny bit flashier and had a little more engaging features aside from the money making.
Same goes for Bitshares Openledger; The technology is there, but it doesn't exactly look sexy or work as seamlessly as the average BTC exchange.
Now, a lot of people are likely to respond that "It's NOT your average social media or exchange" and that's fine. But if we intend to be the best, then why should we continue to lower the standard used for meassurement? And why do so many power users gravitate towards using other platforms instead as soon as the Steem price starts getting a little bearish?
Some tough love.... I love the Steem project and what some innovative people have done to radically improve on this ecosystem, but Steemit clearly is lagging way behind. We don't need to know the exact details of what kind of work they've been doing behind the scene as of late in order to conclude this. If the site looked and worked better, then we would have much faster user growth - even though it has picked up a lot as of late, not thanks to the state of this site - and Steemit very likely would have had more resources to work with as well.
No PR campaign can fix this.
I really don't like to nag and complain much about this site. In the long run, it shouldn't even be the center of this network. But right now, Steemit inc obviously has a huge influence.
So I wonder, how many employes Steemit has coding a fresher looking website right now. Something more estheticaly pleasing, that draws you in and keeps you engaged no matter if you make money or not. Where are those simple little features that will enable this site to compete with Synereo or a similar competitor in the not so distant future?
I leave you with this open question.
Have great day everyone, including Steemit inc, independent developers, whales. Hope you got something of value and that you don't think I got too ranty in my comment. There's no anger in my mind as I write this, just perhaps a different perspective than some have on this situation.
Also written on my phone, so there's the risk of spelling errors etc. Might make a post out of this later.
/Thomas
He might be a little rough around the edges but I feel like @berniesanders does a lot more good than bad. Another thing to add in his favor, he was very generous helping out steemcleaners when it first got going.
Anyone who helps @steemcleaners and #steemitphotochellenge is doing the platform an immeasurable service IMO, even if he is irreverent at times. There's enough polite people causing harm to the platform. I know what I value more.
Bernie gave me my first big upvote ever. It helped me believe that, "holy FUCK, I can do this". I do not mind him being an "asshole" because he is speaking his mind. I appreciate the forward nature of this.
Bernie for god-king 2020.
Easy on the idol worship homie.
I'm building him a statue out of loose cat hair that I find in my house.
I am still trying to keep up ... but thanks for the read! You truly make me giggle as I read it all ... love- love -love. @aggroed you never cease to amaze me!
That's high praise!
Oh well you deserve it!!! Keep up the fabulous posts!!
" The world’s biggest flagging Dedicated Asshole is helping kids, curating the shit out of this place, and protecting us all from whales gaming the system. He’s holding Steemit to task for site slowness and lack of progress on a modern and easy to use GUI. And he’s curating all your minnow posts so you have a chance to grow around here." i think you sum it up here really well, Like Bernie or lothe him, its seems clear to me this guy loves this place as you so rightly say in the paragraph follwing this one ! People dont like flags round here if they get them, but then his political expressions seem to me on the balnce most certainly positive, even if some have not enjoyed his methods !! upvoted @aggroed, this is a beautiful testimony to this Big Bad Whale Bernie with a good heart and I hope put him as he deserves into the legends of this beautiful Steemit Ocean of dreams and reward )
I had heard @berniesanders was twenty feet tall, with a full chest of hair that refused to stay enclosed, his flannel shirt always popping open at the collar.
I caught a glimpse of him once through the trees of a forest full of the sound of bitching and complaining. It was from this vantage point, some 40 yards behind him, that I noticed the two button, old-timey pajama bottoms of a child. At first I was confused, but then he casually reached behind him, dropped the flap, and took a dump all over a small ranch style house in the Whalepool county of Wisconsteem. Then I understood. The glare off his asshole was blinding. And when the smell finally reached me, it had a righteous pugnacity that filled me with hope.
Thank you, you asshole.
photo-credit
Haha, I hadn't heard this part of the legend. Makes sense.
You're a weirdo. I wonder if you'll get flagged for the info you've shared about him. Be ever vigilant.