Group Identities and Comparisons: Elliot Rodger and 'Nice Guys'

[ahunter3]

So, let's say you're espousing pride in some sort of group identity. Could be anything: polyamory, communal living, lefthanded people, people who like to retain their underarm hairs, whatever

Comments

[musicman]

Perhaps Rodger didn't have much of a conscience, nor a good consciousness of others? Whereas, you do, on both counts. When people lose the rational basis of what they hold as normal, it seems to me they are sometimes doing so because they have lost, or never had a conscience. And when the individual is so self-absorbed that he loses consciousness of other people as real, instead of "them bitches" or "those people who rejected me" or "those people who never accepted me," they they can act on ideas, as crazy as they are, without being bothered by thinking it might be wrong.

You seem to have a very good sense of right and wrong, of conscience, and consciousness. You have a desire to help others, and not just yourself. That is the difference I see in the two of you.

i like the hippie look, and the mildness of your manners, which goes well with the hippie look. We all want some kind of cover, so we don't have to stand around forever explaining who we are and what we do. Been there and done that. People want to pigeon-hole us right away because it is easier for them to remember. For instance, if I tell someone I'm an editorial researcher, they don't like it if I go on to talk about my writing, as well as my professional photography. But what are you? they sometimes ask. Which is why polyamory is a threat to many vanilla monogamous people. And why switches are not liked by some of the D/s community. They don't want you to be more than one of anything. Whereas you are successful at being yourself, even with all of your many aspects and complicated being, that is difficult for some to accept.

Something I've had to learn when dealing with some transgendered people is to not ask "Which are you today?" but rather to accept the person may be all three, and may move from female to male to both, because that is what transitions do, and the person is allowed to be that way. If my friend arrives and is especially male at that moment, that is who the person is. And vice versa. That was hard for me to learn, and yet, I was looking to understand, I was looking to find out about transgendered, and yet my own understanding took time.

[ahunter3]

Thank you! That's very affirming and I appreciate it!

>We all want some kind of cover, so we don't have to stand around forever explaining who we are and what we do< Yeah, very well and concisely put!

I do not as of yet have any close genderfluid friends, but I've read about them (autobio and otherwise); I think I, too, would initially find it hard or at least awkward. Transitioning in the older, unidirectional M2F or F2M sense might be easier to learn but as you say the transitioning itself is a process and identity may move around in nonlinear ways over the short term even if the overall trajectory is more linear.