Paparazzi Democrats

There’s Latte Liberals, Blue Dog Democrats, Limousine Liberals, Reagan Democrats, etc. We have many names for different groups on the left. We categorize them by their general life-style and behaviors. The past few days have seen the rise to prominence of a new category. I call them “Paparrazi Democrats”.

Definition: A Democrat with an obsessive drive to assault and slander ideological opponents on politically unrelated family situations without compunction.

Review: Hours after McCain’s announcement of Palin as his running mate, The Obama campaign unleashed a harshly worded attack on Palin’s experience. Realizing the foolishness of the attack, the campaign retracted the statements, calling them a “hair trigger” reaction, and issued a new statement congratulating Palin.

It was clear that the Obama campaign would not be able to attack her directly and be effective. Almost immediately afterwards, The Daily Kos, a pro-Obama group, began spreading rumors that Palin’s newest son was really her daughter’s. It wasn’t long before it lit up the internet and blogs everywhere were buzzing about it. The New York Times and various other left-wing news outlets of the media covered the story with an almost obsessive compulsion.

Palin released a statement dismissing the rumors and stating that her daughter, Bristol, was 5 months pregnant and unwed. While discrediting the original rumors, the statement lead to the creation of many new rumors and speculation about her daughter’s personal life. Reporters flooded her hometown in Alaska, scouring the landscape and general populace for new details of Bristol Palin’s private life.

The only other group that would commit such effort towards the discovery of every little detail into the private life of a 17-year old girl, are the paparazzi. Now that the infamous celebrity stalkers are no longer alone in deliberately humiliating children in front of a large audience, I think that these Obama Supporters, these Democrats, should share the name “Paparazzi” with the widely loathed camera wielders.

Psychology: The psychological reasons that drive a Paparazzi Democrat are little different from those that cause many to obsess over celebrities: voyeurism. It is natural to want to know how others lead their lives; celebrity stalkers and Paparazzi Democrats take it to an unhealthy extreme. As the far-left is the most likely to not associate with others of a different ideology of all political groups, they are also likely to be the most curious. Ignorance breeds curiosity. Other motivations may be involved, though that will differ from person to person. It is something of an article of faith that conservatives are unusually rich, and this may inject resent into the picture. Incidentally, Liberals make about 6-8% more earned income than conservatives, depending on which study you’re looking at. Lastly, there is the most obvious reason: an irrational hatred for those of differing opinions of those farthest to the left. This may remove barriers of social etiquette and morality in the mind of the Paparazzi Democrat, after they’ve demonized those of other beliefs into the grossest caricature they can attain.

Breakdown: Paparazzi Democrats make up roughly 22% of the Democratic party, with a degree of overlap with other groups. This statistic was established by studying a number of polls on related subjects on Democrats and averaging results. It should also be noted that approximately 45.6% of registered Democrats consider themselves to be liberal ideologically. Nearly all Paparazzi Democrats are Liberals.

(Poll data based on studies conducted by Pew Research and Gallup)

Conclusion: Most, including many on the left, find the behavior appalling. Even the source post on The Daily Kos was filled with comments berating it, undoubtedly by many whom, on another night would be preaching hatred. Undaunted, the Paparazzi Democrats continued spreading baseless, salacious rumors even after their original was discredited. Perhaps this development is a product of the reality-tv generation and a sign of our changing times, but one thing is clear: this new group of Democrats is out to destroy lives and intends to stay.