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First of all, in all sincerity and generosity of spirit, credit to this retard for at least being willing to get outside of her bubble.
The vast majority of her comrades at HuffPost or any such rag headquartered in Manhattan would not be so adventurous — in fact, as she notes, they warned her in the sternest terms that she was risking her life agreeing to meet a domestic terrorist for lunch at a busy public diner.
The journey begins with this woman, Jen Golbeck — “a professor at the University of Maryland where she studies extremism, social media, malicious online behavior, and artificial intelligence” —who has apparently been damaged by spending way too much time online, refusing to hold out the possibility that a very real person she is interacting online with is, in fact, a real person.
Via HuffPost (emphasis added):
“I was pretty sure this tweet, sent in response to a recent essay I published on HuffPost detailing my summer interviewing people at Donald Trump rallies, was written by a bot. It had all the telltale signs: mudslinging; a username consisting of a first name followed by a bunch of numbers; and the “MAGA” sign-off.
“Thank you for your comment, name bunchanumbers!” I replied ― to which the account responded: “You are welcome. I have lived in MD a long time and have never seen anyone as biased and full of shit as you are. MAGA.”
We continued to tweet back and forth at each other a few times. I asked for croissant recipes and answers to math questions in hopes of getting the AI I believed to be running the bot to reveal itself. Instead, I eventually got a reply I never saw coming: “Let me take you to lunch next week and discuss how you can help Make America Great Again! My treat. MAGA.”
This was a first for me. As a journalist and researcher who has spent much of the past decade studying the psychology of far-right movements, I’d interacted with countless MAGA die-hards, but none of them had ever invited me to a meal. I was intrigued, so I agreed, and within an hour we had exchanged cell numbers and made a date.”
Nonplussed, she decided to take the MAGA terror-bot up on his offer for the sake of journalism.
Her friends and family clutched their pearls, as she would surely be killed, or raped and then killed, because that’s what domestic terrorists do to Manhattan columnists like her.
Continuing:
“We met on a late Tuesday morning just outside D.C. at Parkway Deli in Silver Spring, Maryland...
My friends and colleagues know about the work I do, but when I told them I was lunching with a MAGA guy I met on X (formerly Twitter), they were worried for my safety (and, in a few cases, my sanity). Two people offered to come to the restaurant and covertly keep an eye on the situation. I later learned that his friends were also opposed to our meetup. He told me they were convinced I was going to doxx him and ruin his life. That is never my goal when I meet with a subject — no matter what their political beliefs are — so I’m not using his name in this essay. Instead, I’ll only refer to him as “Bunchanumbers.”
Bunchanumbers is an energetic family man in his mid-50s with swept-back silver hair who looked comfortable in his shirt and tie*. We kicked off our conversation noting that we both split our time between homes in Florida and Maryland. We ordered bagels, plus bacon and iced tea for him. We chatted about how long we’d each been married, where we went to college, and how he takes care of his aging parents and finds fulfillment in helping people…
Bunchanumbers is earnest in his belief that Trump’s policies are best for the country, and that we will be more united and prosperous under a second Trump term. I was impressed with how much he reads and internalizes information (and, yes, misinformation).”
*The reason Jen was so moved as to write an entire essay on this topic is that, when someone says “MAGA,” her deranged mind instantly conjures an image of a bumpkin in overalls and rubber fishing boots with tobacco juice dribbling down his chin and a shotgun in hand ready to go mow down some hatecrime victims at the coloreds-only swimming hole for sport.
A literate Trump supporter in a suit and tie instead of a white hood so shook her perception of reality that she felt compelled to relay the wild tale to all of her fellow retards in the HuffPost readership.
Ben Bartee is an independent Bangkok-based American journalist with opposable thumbs.
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