To call Trump’s AMA (Ask Me Anything) an AMA would be a complete exaggeration. Yesterday, the subreddit r/The_Donald, was hosting a Q&A for Trump. The idea was that people could ask Trump any question, and he would answer them.
But as I reported yesterday, r/The_Donald locked down the subreddit so thoroughly that asking questions was a near impossibility. Essentially, the moderators turned the space dedicated to a man who many see as their anti-SJW savior, into a safe space for that very man. Sad!
Some who reacted to my article informed me of downvote brigades that planned to interfere with the AMA, but the rules posted by the mods made it so that even fans of Donald Trump couldn’t ask a simple question. In fact, if you weren’t a proven loyalist, you didn’t get a voice.
Trump’s AMA is not like most AMAs. Pro-Trump mods are screening q’s, only allowing established supporters to participate.
— Benjy Sarlin (@BenjySarlin) July 27, 2016
Even the moderators were apparently relegated to certain rules, as a post from Milo Yianoppoulos, one of the mods, had a post of his deleted.
Milo asked about net neutrality and the mods deleted his question pic.twitter.com/ZaPiGpomOU
— Adrianne Jeffries (@adrjeffries) July 27, 2016
As people clamored to get in to ask him anything, moderators were banning questioners left and right. One mod bragged that they had banned over 2,000 “shills,” saying that they were “battle-hardened shill-slayers.”
The answers he gave to the questions that were allowed ranged from insubstantial, to just downright eye roll worthy. For instance, this user asked how Trump will deal with the media elites that are controlling the narrative, to which Trump responded that he’s concerned about it, and the new media is a great way to get the truth out.
Or this user who asked a five part question, and got non-answers for only two.
Or this poor user who asked a simple question, and got a really stupid answer.
Needless to say, Trump’s “Ask Me Only Certain Things” looked like every other Q&A he’s given, where he spouts off some numbers then gives a very roundabout, general response that leaves you with more questions than it does answers. One user even compared Obama’s AMA to Trump’s and used the “money in politics” question for contrast.
When Obama makes you look bad, you’ve got a problem.
All in all, Trump only “answered” 12 questions before calling it a night. The questions were many, the answers were few, and what answers we did get were so useless it was hardly worth the time to read them. While it was a success number wise – beating out Obama’s AMA in comments – the softball questions, and line after line of butt kissing, and the high number of bans made the venture look sort of embarrassing for Trump.
If you’d like to view the thread yourself, you can by following the link here.
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