no, you're not actually cool or iconoclastic -- you're just an asshole
A few days ago, I was on a social networking site (not Facecrack), doing my usual cursory glance over the "news feed," and I happened to notice a friend commenting on their friend's journal entry with regard to a caption someone else had put on one of their images. I wish I could find that image again so that I could quote from thread word-for-word, but it's too much effort for now, so fuck it.
Basically the not-friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend had posted an image that was a collection of popular vampires from Dracula to Edward Sullen Cullen; each vampire that was not conventionally attractive was labelled "vampire", and each vampire that was conventionally attractive was labelled "faggot." (Never mind that the ones that were conventionally attractive were attractive in the way that many male-loving females find incredibly attractive. Methinks I detect a hint of jealousy on the OP's part.) The OP clearly thought it was hilarious. His friends likewise thought it was hilarious.
Someone commented saying that they found the picture more stupid and nonsensical than funny, and added that putting "faggot" on a picture wasn't a shortcut to instant humour. Naturally, this caused indignant responses from the OP and his friends. There were (of course) comments telling the dissenter that they were just being PC, and (of course) comments saying how nobody could take a joke any more, and how (of course) it was society's problem that the OP said something really stupid and people found it stupid (because of political correctness, of course).
The crowning comment came from the OP (and here's where I'm really wishing I could quote word for word). The gist of it was this: we have become so incredibly politically correct that we can't laugh at jokes that are inherently funny, such as his calling attractive men "faggots," and so he was bravely standing against oppression by making jokes like that.
At this point the stupid got to be way too much for me and I stopped reading. See, here's what I can't understand: what's so brave about an anonymous but self-proclaimed "straight white middle-aged middle-class American man" using gaybashing slurs? Can someone please tell me this? Seems to me that effective public opinion actually favours thoughts like his for the most part, even though people have at least come to the point where they realize it's ignorant to say "queers are gross so we should make fun of them."
It's that whole attitude of "I'm being rude and offensive -- aren't I brave and admirable?" or "I'm disagreeable and I'm proud of it!" that makes me want to take a baseball hat to someone's head. No, you're not brave and admirable -- you're wilfully ignorant, and backwards, and smug, and self-assured, and arrogant, and totally not even understanding the meaning of the word "brave."
You don't stand to lose your job or be beat up by expressing an opinion that's at least latently held by most of your peers and has centuries of custom and law behind it. All you have to fear from voicing your opinion is...what? That someone else is going to tell you what a loser you are and you'll have to waste the energy on being all butthurt that someone isn't taking your verbal diarrhea seriously? And you call this the oppression you have to stand up against? Seriously. Grow the fuck up. All you're doing is showing everyone how incredibly full of fail you are.
At least that saves me the time and effort of experiencing the full effects of that kind of fail for myself. Goodness knows there's enough of it to sift through already.
Basically the not-friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend had posted an image that was a collection of popular vampires from Dracula to Edward Sullen Cullen; each vampire that was not conventionally attractive was labelled "vampire", and each vampire that was conventionally attractive was labelled "faggot." (Never mind that the ones that were conventionally attractive were attractive in the way that many male-loving females find incredibly attractive. Methinks I detect a hint of jealousy on the OP's part.) The OP clearly thought it was hilarious. His friends likewise thought it was hilarious.
Someone commented saying that they found the picture more stupid and nonsensical than funny, and added that putting "faggot" on a picture wasn't a shortcut to instant humour. Naturally, this caused indignant responses from the OP and his friends. There were (of course) comments telling the dissenter that they were just being PC, and (of course) comments saying how nobody could take a joke any more, and how (of course) it was society's problem that the OP said something really stupid and people found it stupid (because of political correctness, of course).
The crowning comment came from the OP (and here's where I'm really wishing I could quote word for word). The gist of it was this: we have become so incredibly politically correct that we can't laugh at jokes that are inherently funny, such as his calling attractive men "faggots," and so he was bravely standing against oppression by making jokes like that.
At this point the stupid got to be way too much for me and I stopped reading. See, here's what I can't understand: what's so brave about an anonymous but self-proclaimed "straight white middle-aged middle-class American man" using gaybashing slurs? Can someone please tell me this? Seems to me that effective public opinion actually favours thoughts like his for the most part, even though people have at least come to the point where they realize it's ignorant to say "queers are gross so we should make fun of them."
It's that whole attitude of "I'm being rude and offensive -- aren't I brave and admirable?" or "I'm disagreeable and I'm proud of it!" that makes me want to take a baseball hat to someone's head. No, you're not brave and admirable -- you're wilfully ignorant, and backwards, and smug, and self-assured, and arrogant, and totally not even understanding the meaning of the word "brave."
You don't stand to lose your job or be beat up by expressing an opinion that's at least latently held by most of your peers and has centuries of custom and law behind it. All you have to fear from voicing your opinion is...what? That someone else is going to tell you what a loser you are and you'll have to waste the energy on being all butthurt that someone isn't taking your verbal diarrhea seriously? And you call this the oppression you have to stand up against? Seriously. Grow the fuck up. All you're doing is showing everyone how incredibly full of fail you are.
At least that saves me the time and effort of experiencing the full effects of that kind of fail for myself. Goodness knows there's enough of it to sift through already.