Jarrod Golden’s Divisive Social Media Posts

Jarrod Golden is running for Franklin County Auditor in 2022. When he previously ran for County Clerk of Courts in 2020, his social media posts revealed a man willing to spread divisiveness and generalizations.

On his now-deleted Facebook page golden4clerk, Golden characterized “the left” with an image of a man giving the middle finger to an elderly couple purportedly leaving the Republican convention, and insinuates that “the left” is not peaceful. This gross generalization of politically left-leaning people is divisive and unacceptable behavior for a candidate for public office.

The behavior of the younger man should be condemned as dishonorable and unnecessarily aggressive by all rational people regardless of political affiliation, and many politically left-leaning citizens would agree with Golden in criticizing that behavior. We should unite in rejecting violent and disrespectful behavior such as this, regardless of political leanings.

However, it is inappropriate and not true for Golden to project this behavior onto half the country who support Democratic or progressive candidates or positions. Clearly not all protestors have been peaceful, but that does not reflect the behavior or views of all left-leaning people, or even of all protestors.

Similarly, extremist white supremacists do not reflect the behavior or views of all right-leaning people, and this site condemns the idea that all Republicans are racist. It would be similarly inappropriate to post “The peaceful right…?” next to an image of a neo-Nazi white supremacist attacking somebody, such as when James Alex Fields Jr. killed and injured people with his car in Charlottesville in 2017. The action by the person was condemnable, and the extremist ideology that fueled it is reprehensible as well, but it does not reflect an entire half of our country who support conservative policies and peace.

When a candidate for office demonizes half our population, it casts our fellow citizens as enemies, which can incite more violence and make our country a more dangerous place to live. Instead, we must be specific regarding which ideology or individual we condemn, while uniting with fellow citizens of either party in discouraging these extremes.

Also, by stating his position as an open-ended question, he uses loose language that allows him to make an understood assertion without the accountability of having made the assertion. This site is against this kind of loose language insinuation.

In another recent post, Golden further derides left-leaning voters by showing the image of a truck underwater, suggesting this is representative of a person who is voting for Joe Biden.

Another broadly demeaning post that Golden shared:

This site discourages derisive and divisive memes such as these being shared by candidates for public office. This kind of unprofessional commentary further polarizes our citizens, which risks our strength of unity and cooperation as a nation.

Golden has also shared posts from the websites InfoWars and NewsPunch, both known for spreading false information and unfounded conspiracy theories, as well as a post from LifeNews which was flagged as false information.

Regarding education, Golden stated that he attended Ohio Dominican University for “a while”, suggesting that he did not complete his higher education.

In 2022, Golden has new Facebook and Twitter accounts with few posts so far. This year his opponent is incumbent Auditor Michael Stinziano, who has a master’s degree in public administration and a law degree from Ohio State University. Golden lost this race.

In 2020, Golden was defeated by incumbent Clerk of Courts Maryellen O’Shaughnessy, who has a Bachelor’s Degree from Ohio State University. Her Facebook page VoteOShaughnessy turned up no inflammatory posts or memes. She won with 67% of the vote.

References

goldenforauditor.com (2022)

Columbus Dispatch: O’Shaughnessy, Golden face off for Franklin County clerk of courts (2020)

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