Were social justice warriors responsible for the election outcome?

[Rev. Rye]

Since about 2012 or so, the SJW's have been on the rise; the jerks who use progressive sounding, virtuous buzzwords to justify being jerks. 

So you mean regressive leftists because  that's what they literally are.

Yeah, there needs to be a better word for the leftists who, despite obstensively supporting left-wing causes, have rhetoric and style that seems to come straight out of the far-right's handbook, particularly when they end up using that same logic to reach conclusions identical to the far-right, like this little incident, or Azaelia Banks supporting Trump specifically because he's "evil" (her words, not mine, surprisingly enough) and Hilary Clinton talks down too much to minorities.

It's like some people are too concerned about wolves in sheep's clothing that they have decided they have no choice but to accept the wolf for what it is. Fortunately, they have less power than their alt-right counterpoints, but are probably far more annoying, especially to the more sane leftists.

The term "SJW" (and to a lesser extent, regressive left) has been poisoned far beyond the point of salvagability. There needs to be a term for those sort of Jackasses that, hopefully, the right-wingers won't poison. Sadly, the best thing I can think of is "Reactionary Left," because that actually fits their tone (and to a lesser extent, their content) better.

[account_inactive]

The days of SJWs bullying everyone and throwing around their buzzwords are over.

[Minimalist]

If they did they fucked themselves but good.

They? I hate to tell you this but you are part of them.

Hey, I voted Heinrich.

[Vincent]

I am on another forum with many SJW's on it, and when I tried to propose this thought to one of the members (and not rudely, mind you, I was very respectful about it), they blew up at me and then demanded I don't use the word "SJW". 

I think far left liberals have, unconsciously or not, good intentions or not, made a habit of vilifying the white male in America. This talk of "privilege" bullshit, of painting all minorities as victims and all but saying that white men are selfish and cannot have problems of their own that even stack up in comparison to a black man, or a woman, has pushed people further from the left. It makes me irritated to be a democrat, and it makes me borderline ashamed of my own generation (I am in my early 20's, and this seems to be the age range most of them fall into).

Edit: that being said, I don't think this was the only factor and I believe if another candidate had won the nomination, the democrats still might have taken the election.

[Regina]

So you mean regressive leftists because  that's what they literally are.

The term "SJW" (and to a lesser extent, regressive left) has been poisoned far beyond the point of salvagability. There needs to be a term for those sort of Jackasses that, hopefully, the right-wingers won't poison. 

I agree with everything you say in your post, but unfortunately I think this is a given. The alt-right is an opportunistic movement that appeals to traditionally centre or left-leaning people by exploiting the weaknesses of the Left. Notice how the alt-right are all about "rights" and "freedoms" and "freedom of speech" these days? In other words, they suddenly love all the principles that were fought for by The Left against the Right over the past few centuries. They can do that to appeal to traditional Leftists because they know The contemporary Left has dropped those crusades and it's not sitting well with a lot of people.

And yes, that extends to terms used to criticise the Left too. Any time we as leftists introduce a term to self-criticise, they'll appropriate it, take it out of context and over-use it to exploit.

I think the only way to soften the effect of that is to maintain a simultaneous criticism of the alt-right while we have these discussions about "regressive leftism" among ourselves, reclaim the terms. Call out the alt-right for what they are, opportunists, get more people to see that and their tactics should stop working. We need a strong centre-political voice, which is opposed to both "regressive Leftism" but also doesn't leave the alt-Right un-challenged.

[TaraJo]

The days of SJWs bullying everyone and throwing around their buzzwords are over.

I hope you're right, but judging from what I've seen from Huffington Post and a host of other left-leaning sites, there's no sign of them letting up right now.  I mean, hell, the left is using safety pins as a sign of support towards minorities feeling threatened by the prospect of a Trump presidency and a whole host of left leaning sites are chastising white people for trying to show that support.  Maybe they'll learn their lesson when they get to see what REAL oppression is like.  Unfortunately, with Republicans in charge of the white house, both houses of congress and the supreme court, they're going to learn it very quickly; and it's going to be ugly for everyone.

I feel like SJW's or the regressive left or whatever you want to call them, they're the left wing equalivant of the tea party: ridiculous reactionaries who make the rest of their party look bad by comparison.  Maybe the democratic elected officials need to deal with the SJW's the same way the Republicans dealt with the tea party.

[Thumpalumpacus]

It cracks me up that I get called an SJW. I stand against bigotry wherever I see it, but PC isn't my style.

It ain't my circus ... ain't my monkeys. But slapping a pejorative label on me is not going to shut me up when I see bullshit.

[account_inactive]

It cracks me up that I get called an SJW. I stand against bigotry wherever I see it, but PC isn't my style.

It ain't my circus ... ain't my monkeys. But slapping a pejorative label on me is not going to shut me up when I see bullshit.

You're such an SJW!

[Catholic_Lady]

I can't help but look at the election results and think, in hindsight, I can't be too surprised.  

Since about 2012 or so, the SJW's have been on the rise; the jerks who use progressive sounding, virtuous buzzwords to justify being jerks.  Before, they were always on the fringe for everyone to laugh at their absurdity.  You can go to Tumblr and find them all over the place and they're increasingly getting more influential on twitter.  But lately, they've been getting more noticed, especially on college campuses.  

It feels like suicide for the democrats and even for the reasonable republicans.  I mean, seriously: white people, like it or not, are the majority here, but in this election cycle, these people turned "white male" into an insult in the name of progressivism.  I don't know how they think a democracy works, but you don't win elections by insulting the majority.  Not to mention, there's the boy-who-cried-wolf effect: we've gotten so used to bratty college kids calling everything racism that when Trump is saying or doing things that are genuinely racist, we ignore it.  Racism is a term that's so over-used that it lost its meaning, opening the doors for legitimate, serious racism.

And the kicker?  Hillary focused on them but ignored the rust belt states that used to be the backbone of the democratic party.  Yeah, the middle class factory workers in Ohio, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.  Their jobs are suddenly being outsourced to Asian sweatshops and they aren't exactly trained to work the jobs that are replacing them.  Yet, instead of talking about those issues, progressives are dismissing them because they're "white males."  Instead of listening to their concerns, their worries, their issues, they're being chastised for not memorizing a 19-year-old's ten sylable gender identity that he just came up with last week.  Trump, to his credit, actually showed concern for them, claiming he'll back out of Nafta and bring manufacturing back from China (I don't think he'll actually be able to do either, but at least he's showing concern).  You want to flip this election around, have Hillary address labor issues, manufacturing jobs, things like that, and don't just cater to a bunch of spoiled college kids.

^Exactly what I've tried to say on here.

[KUSA]

It cracks me up that I get called an SJW. I stand against bigotry wherever I see it, but PC isn't my style.

It ain't my circus ... ain't my monkeys. But slapping a pejorative label on me is not going to shut me up when I see bullshit.

Anymore you are either a bigot or a sjw. There is no in between.