Weasel language
Hi Internet,
If you dog pile someone from a socially accepted unassailable position of strength you are not a hero. Particularly if you engage in dissent shaming and complain about people being mindless. Then go on to imply that this person is engaging in behaviour, or in this case thinking, that contributes to a pretty damn serious issues like ( Read more... )
I feel pretty passionately about women being treated equally to men in society. I was raised that way and I would say that it, alongside equal rights for homosexuals, are one of the few things I would call a fundamental, essential value of myself. As such I often render comments on these things which may in some cases be focused more on expression of what I feel to be the core ethical value - "women have literally and exactly every right to do exactly whatever men can do."
I am often in a slightly odd position on these matters. Due to both the social privilege of my gender and the fact that I am often willing to die, so to speak, on this particular hill, I can often speak quite freely and openly. We have known each other long enough that it would be fair for me to assert, I think, that there is not much malice in my nature.
As such I will feel free to say to you, that I feel you are being un-civil to criticism which is being levied primarily at an opinion that James is expressing (and developing further in the comments.) I can certainly agree that it is frustrating to be told, flat-out, that you are wrong; I know this, not least, because you have done it to me, not least (if implicitly) in this post right here.
I feel that you are developing an unfounded argument about what the motivations of people who are disagreeing with James are doing. It is obvious that James is not 'the distortion in the world.' However, he is my friend, and perhaps I feel he is expressing an opinion I disagree with - I will attempt, perhaps, to persuade him of the rightness of my view within the bounds of friendship. (I make no attempt here because every point I would make has been made amply by others, and I don't particularly have a dog in the latest episode of what seems to me to be the unending seizure of my enjoyed recreational hobbies and media industries by cowardly and entitled persons. To be clear, I speak here generally of the 'troll hordes', not of yourself or James.) It would be James' right to ask me to refrain from the topic, although I would likely ask consideration of a similar sort in return.
I object very strongly to the portrayal that you made in James' thread, and indirectly, here, that we - speaking here as 'a person tending to argue feminist perspectives' - are being bullies. It is quite possible of course that people are being uncivil and it is reasonable to ask for decorum, but I do not feel decorum was being profoundly breached. Perhaps people were being casual or a little snappy, but this is an issue people often feel extremely strongly about. I am one of those people, of course.
However, I have been injured substantially by bullies - in the literal and physical sense. I have been hospitalized for infections due to the after-effects of injuries inflicted upon me by bullying children, and I have a permanent divot in my skull due to the resolution of those infections. I feel that this is a very strong term to throw on people for energetic but civil disagreement.
I do not believe people are attempting to assail James from a socially accepted unassailable position of strength. I can list a variety of pieces of social evidence from the recent pages of the newspaper which indicate that we are hardly in a utopia of equality or one in which white men, such as myself, are disadvantaged meaningfully on a societywide level.
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You basically don't be a jerk to anyone. The end. As far as I'm concerned that should negate the very need for feminist thought because treating women as equals shouldn't be an issue. Women get treated as equals. Men get treated as equals. End of story.
I do not feel any kind of privilege or superiority in having a penis or having a Y chromosome. I have been from a very young age expected to clean up, make my dad a coffee and clean things. No women only bullshit in my household when I was a boy.
However there was men only bullshit like digging holes and doing the dirty jobs. That's okay, my mum has rheumatism. Besides her time could be better spent taking a break from time to time. She works hard.
To address your point about malice? You're cool. We're still meant to have drinks one day. Though I'm planning on unilaterally getting everybody on M3 (and other mushes) drunk when I finally get you all in a bar together.
As to the motivations of the people who attacked James and belittled his intelligence, spoke to him in very unkind and harsh tones I ascribe no motivation beyond being passionate about their point of view. The fact that they felt the need to make him feel small to make their point, and in no uncertain terms telling him to "Smarten up" is crime enough.
The truth is I don't know these people. James himself described these people to me as his friends. If they're friends of James, they're unwittingly friends of mine. I'm a lad. I ain't got time to make things personal with these people. I have good times, share jokes, and tell people to pull their head in when they're acting silly. I'm simply reminding them that friends don't let friends do certain things. Like demean mutual friends. It's not cool. Go back to being cool and I'm happy.
BUT what they're doing is seeing the mild mannered nice boy posting a contrary opinion, and attempting to shame him into changing his opinion. To 'smarten him up' as it were. I could make some ironic, wry musing as is my wont. But that would just be cruel to those people. Cruelty is not my game.
I hope that my examples given above educate you on my point of view. People used to bully me mentally. Make me feel small for having different opinions. Having a funny name. Making character's called Fatih Mehmet and make crass penis jokes like Fatty Helmet when I dare to share a piece of my culture with an American audience. You may not think I have been bullied. You might see my confidence, and if you ask people like Prismatic Spider or the vent crew about how it is 'impossible to insult me'. Those aren't my words, ask James and Ryan.
But people have been. And those mutual friends of yours and James used the same tactics on James that people used to use on me. And I will put it plainly.
If you have an opinion worth making, you can do it without being cruel and hurtful to someone who is meant to be your friend. I might be Turkish, but I am speaking pretty okay English. Making James feel small is not how you treat someone for thinking it might be possible that people take a good idea too far. Or abuse people who are passionate about the idea that women are just as deserving as men.
Guess what. James is as deserving of kindness as any of you.
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I do not deny that any given person has been bullied in their past. The fact that I have a physical scar rather than purely mental ones is my misfortune but does not mean other people were not also abused.
I believe that calling others the name of the abuser is not a good way to cause them to shape up their behavior. It would be better, for instance, to say 'I feel you're being rather unfair to James personally here, as in (short quote) and as his friend I would appreciate it if you could focus upon the topic without what seem to me to be digs at his person.' I feel that it would be better because you are focusing upon the sin and not the sinner (so to speak).
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