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Marko_Ramius1 t1_j6nwz06 wrote

Reply to comment by Little_Noodles in Gym bashes Union League, goes to cocktail party there next week by MagnusUnda

Plenty of companies/businesses host events there. My current job used to host a big local industry conference there pre Covid, and my former job had our Christmas dinner there once. If you're a member then you can reserve the space for your firm/organization/whatever. Stands to reason at least one person who's a higher up in the contractors association is a member

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Little_Noodles t1_j6nxs0o wrote

Yeah, the Union League as an organization can suck my fat Philly tits. But it’s located in a gorgeous building that is well-located for events like this, which is why it’s constantly being used for events like this.

Declaring that politicians can’t ever go inside the building unless they’ve never criticized the organization basically just prevents politicians from making the criticism, because going into that building to do facetime with groups like this is part of their job.

Given that the article doesn’t clarify a relationship otherwise, I’m not seeing anything here that’s more than a cosmetic problem

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Marko_Ramius1 t1_j6nzz2z wrote

>Declaring that politicians can’t ever go inside the building unless they’ve never criticized the organization basically just prevents politicians from making the criticism, because going into that building to do facetime with groups like this is part of their job.

If you're a politician then you're already a cheat and a liar by virtue of your profession. But if you make a stand about something you claim to believe in, then completely ignore it in less than a week, then that just shows you're even more an empty suit then the rest of them. You have to anticipate there will be consequences to taking a stand like that, i.e missing out on events such as this.

There will for sure plenty of other opportunities to gladhand the old boy/Philly establishment network, and I highly doubt Gym was the only candidate there last night. She was just the only one dumb enough to forcefully denounce the Union League then show up the next week.

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Little_Noodles t1_j6o0t92 wrote

So if she showed up say, three weeks later, it’d be ok?

And yeah, it’s a dumb move in that it opened the door for someone even dopier to dunk on her. But if nobody actually seriously expects her to never walk through those doors again, it’s an issue of timing and optics. But that amounts to a PR error, which is a dumb thing to get too worked up about

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Marko_Ramius1 t1_j6o1dng wrote

https://twitter.com/HelenGymPHL/status/1617959371824336896

>Philly will always stand against the racism, homophobia, xenophobia, and the bigotry that The Union League decided to honor today. Hate has no home here. #ByeDeSantis

Saying always really precludes her from doing that

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Little_Noodles t1_j6o1pep wrote

And never setting foot in any building owned by assholes that she’s rightly criticized precludes her from running for office in Philadelphia.

Gym’s not my first choice, and probably not even my second. But I do want to vote for someone that isn’t a fan of the Union League, and I’m not going to get mad at them for doing the kind of bare minimum public appearances every politician has to do if they’re going to successfully run for office. It’s not an ideological purity contest.

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Marko_Ramius1 t1_j6o2wzl wrote

If she's going to take a stand like that, then she should probably know as a politician how to work around issues like that so as to prevent that in the future, instead of being such an absolutist.

I could care less about the politics of the Union League/DeSantis, but considering the past honorees of that award he got include George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld, I'm shocked DeSantis is somehow the straw that broke the camels back here re the Union League's right-leaning political views being out of sync with Philadelphia at large

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Little_Noodles t1_j6o3fsz wrote

Again, that’s optics. A thing most politicians at a high enough level hire staff to take care of. It’s just not a big deal to me.

And it would require her to keep silent when the Union League does something shitty, which they do on the regular. And to me, that’s a bigger failing than a PR whoopsie.

It’s not any kind of straw. Announcing that the Union League organization sucks and can kick rocks is something that happens all the time here. I’d be shocked if she hasn’t made similar public statements in the past.

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Ams12345678 t1_j6p4u4q wrote

To be fair, not every member of The Union League is a Republican. My friend’s parents belong and they’re far left leaning. It’s a country club that people use for business purposes and connections.

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Little_Noodles t1_j6p5ebt wrote

Eehhhhh, you’re not wrong. But at this point, in my opinion, being a member of the Union League for the business and connections is kind of like maintaining your membership at a whites only country club for the same reasons or just for the golf, even though you personally aren’t that fired up about miscegenation.

Your friends parents might vote a certain way, but it sounds like their primary political affiliation is “rich”, which is an inherently apolitical stance.

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