On Oct. 16, losing District E representative Stef Mendell posted her grievances regarding the election results of the Raleigh City Council on Facebook. In her grievance, she questions Saige Martin’s racial background, job experience, and past experiences with poverty. Similarly, on Oct. 10, City Council reelected member David Cox posted on Facebook his negative anticipations regarding the new pro-development members.
While Cox and Mendell probably had intentions of unifying individuals to their arguments, they are actually both dividing and harming the Raleigh community by acting out in unprofessional ways.
Let’s start by breaking down Mendell’s post. Mendell starts off by stating, “Anticipating that the N&O will not publish my LTE.” Simply put, if Mendell believed The News & Observer would not publish her letter to the editor, she should have attempted to discuss it with another publishing company. Facebook should not be used as the beginning of a government accusation, as that’s incredibly unprofessional and should be reserved as a last resort.
Similarly, many of Mendell’s claims for investigation towards Martin are also unprofessional. While Mendell has the right to be skeptical about her colleague’s capabilities in City Council, pinning accusatory questions without proof or reason is harmful. Many of Mendell’s accusations were disproved by Martin, further highlighting how little she cared about doing proper and amiable investigation. I’m assuming that Mendell was not acting on discriminatory implicit biases, but diverting her Facebook post to discredit the experiences of a minority without linking any evidence reeks of unfair allegations for the sake of discrediting an individual.
The remainder of Mendell’s post is dedicated to fact-checking some of her criticisms, with two being very specific situations regarding a sidewalk and a restaurant opening. A lot of this reads as ‘salty,’ and the commenters were quick to note. Mendell’s reception to the post is most definitely not positive and only serves to highlight that these kinds of posts are not productive whatsoever. They might cause some buzz in local newspapers, but they ultimately end up being an embarrassment to the City Council by framing it as petulant.
David Cox’s Facebook post, in contrast to Mendell’s fiery accusations, are depressingly fatalistic. Cox states “I should be elated for this victory. Instead I am the exact opposite,” and he continues to make assumptions about what he perceives to be the downfall of a once-great City Council. While I understand some of Cox’s grievances, for example deforestation in the Wakefield area, I’m disappointed in his lack of professionalism. The new City Council hasn’t even started, and he’s already admitting to being unwilling to work with it due to political disagreements.
These candidates could very well seek election in future terms, and we need to start encouraging them to act like mature adults when they lose, and when they win. It isn’t a bad thing for candidates to express their concerns, but rather how they are choosing to express them that comes off as unprofessional and petty. Explosive and fatalistic rants will not serve to get more believers in your cause, but rather alienate yourself for the sake of clout. The beauty of politics is that they are largely driven by the people’s interests. Sometimes they match with your party’s interests, and sometimes they don’t. And that’s okay. What is not okay is unjustly attacking individuals without giving them a fair chance.
