Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Il Palazzo]

I'm an absolute Sage but only when I have the Thyme.

[Loud Whispers]

That's a lot to parsely over. But we'd do minty to remember we're all cumin this together

[Magmacube_tr]

I am a bit mixed about this whole thing. But I do know one thing for certain.

It is that Max is under no obligation to respect or show tolerance to an ideology and a group of people who would gladly turn them against a wall and shoot. Respect is not a factor in this situation.

I can relate to them, I exist in a culture which doesn't even registers me as a valid person inside its moral code. Alongside that, I live hidden inside a religion that orders me dead. A significant portion of its adherents would have me hurled off an apartment and splatter.

There is hardly any reasoning with these kinds of people and doctrines. My hatred is not as intense as Max's, but I won't reconcile either; There is nothing about this to reconcile.

As far as I can see, there is no one true answer or one valid course of thought here. As with everything that concerns humans, there is a whole lot of fine nuance in this. Engaging with fascists may be appopriate or futile in different situations. It may or may not pay off.

Such is life I guess? I dunno.

[Rolan7]

And now I am confident that you know next to nothing about people you hate. The use of bigoted labels like cishets proves it.

Pffff, yeah okay XD  I'm definitely taking you very seriously now.

Like trust me, there are secret places where hurt queer people congregate and blow off steam about the daily bigotry of "normal" people, and the words we use are a lot ruder than cishet.  What an astounding display of fragility.  Maybe you shouldn't be clamoring for free speech if you're so easily offended by clinical terms.  Perhaps you need a safe space?

That's a lot to parsely over. But we'd do minty to remember we're all cumin this together

lewd!!
It's also just mind-boggling to me that people can call Twitter an echo-chamber.  Good luck expressing any opinions without being bombarded with low-effort quips - it's what the platform is optimized for.  It's not a place for productive discussion.  It twists otherwise reasonable people into base attention seekers, mechanically.

It's also still a platform for every hateful bigot, and I'm talking genocidal fucks, who has the two brain cells necessary to avoid making deliberate calls for violence.  Dumbass leftists get banned for threatening to "eat the rich" (or in one case, "do a Carthage" on someone for insulting their friend's mom) just like dipshits like Alex Jones get banned for "X is literally a demon and it would be great if someone helped God kill them".  It's a platform based on a weird gimmick, and it has a little utility, but it is an awful place to try to reason with people.

Anyway sorry for interrupting the meme-ing, here's my contribution:

[EuchreJack]

The only appropriate response to that meme

[Strongpoint]

This is basically telling a victim of domestic violence that they need to reconcile with their abuser.

Not a good analogy. No one is saying that Max should approach some homophobe and go like "You know, we are both wrong and let us try to find a common ground." 

It is also not a safe idea...

But when it is safe, it is a far better approach to go "You are wrong. I am not what you think. I am this and this. I do not wish for us to be enemies." especially if we are talking about a random person with no history of actual evil acts (and there are a big distance between doing evil acts, advocating for evil acts, and merely having stupid prejudices)

It is that Max is under no obligation to respect or show tolerance to an ideology and a group of people who would gladly turn them against a wall and shoot. Respect is not a factor in this situation.

Respect is earned, not given so no one has such an obligation. Tolerance, on the other hand, is rather useful for the normal functionality of society. If you don't show tolerance - don't expect one. It is that simple.

It is freaking easy to tolerate opinions you find fine. Tolerance makes sense only when you actively dislike those opinions. And tolerance doesn't mean silence. For example, tolerance never stopped me from saying outright blasphemous things straight in the face of religious persons when I found it necessary.

Oh, sometimes I wish to silence all religious propaganda so hard...

[Strongpoint]

Like trust me, there are secret places where hurt queer people congregate and blow off steam about the daily bigotry of "normal" people, and the words we use are a lot ruder than cishet.  What an astounding display of fragility.

*Rolls eyes*

I have been called a Nazi, a liberast*, a stinky gay (usually for confronting homophobes), transphobe, misogynist, feminist's c***licker, satanist and many, many more words. 

*Russian slur combining liberal and gay-pedophile in one word

I couldn't care less about any stupid label someone tries to put on me. Words like "cishet" stink of hating people not for actions, not even for views or opinions but for their very nature and this type of labels, quite frankly, disgust me. But it has nothing to do with fragility.

[Dunamisdeos]

Wall of text!

Spoiler: My thoughts as someone who has spent a lot of time with the religious side (click to show/hide)

I've... spent a great deal of time with people who believe that homosexuaility is a sin. You have to understand that the majority of them (and I've known quite a few) literally do not understand, and are at present incapable of doing so. They did not grow up with any kind of exposure to people not of their own viewpoint, and were taught specifically by people like their parents, their grandparents, their friends, their heroes, that those who are not straight are sinful, unnatural, or sick and pitiable at best. These are people who took them to get ice cream when they were 6, or helped them meet their spouses, or took them to the hospital when they were hurt, or chipped in and gave them money when they couldn't pay their rent. It goes deeper than just people in their clique in many, many cases.
 
It's a natural connection to us, but the idea that not accepting an LGBTQ person is a form of bigotry is absolutely alien to people like this. An IRL example came up recently for me. Person A is religious, person B recently came out as lesbian. These two people were very close friends. However, B knew that A's perspective on homosexuality was that it is a sin, hard stop. B said they were sorry, but they couldn't maintain their friendship. A asked if they could still be friends and just not talk about their homosexuality, which was obviously unacceptable to B, but A legitimately did not understand why not, and felt B was being unreasonable.
 
I explained to them as an example that my son is autistic, to whom A is close family. Could A be friends with someone who said "I believe that child is sinful for having autism, and that they shouldn't exist as they are an affront before God, but we can just not talk about it and be friends"? Of course not. That's just not how it works, and that made them start thinking. The connection that they were asking a close friend to spend time with them while actively denying a core part of their very being was simply not there. It is not an inborn connection to people who weren't raised in the environment we were. And mind you, there ARE hateful, violent people who would like to shoot all the gays. They exist. But they are maintained by people who really just don't get it. IMO the best way to bring down the ideology is to bring down that wall of ignorance, and that involves talking to them, and spending regular time with them, and making sure they are able to see LGBTQ folks as just people. That's an especially difficult thing right now because that's not always safe to do. I'm just lucky to be in a position where I can talk to people who aren't also dangerous. I'm also not their target, which makes it completely different for me. I recognize that I am not in any personal danger, which makes it a lot easier to talk about friendship and kindness and understand and whatnot. But I only got where I am ideologically because despite being raised in that environment I had opportunity to make close friends who folks who are LGBTQ, and they remain some of the best people I know.
 
Person A is still responsible for growing on their own, and for whether or not they still hold their previous viewpoint. But if person B was in trouble, they'd stop to help. If they saw someone from their own church abusing person B, they'd step in to stop it. They just literally do not automatically understand the deeply harmful effect they are having on other people.

TLDR: Gotta attack the ideology of oppression against LGBTQ with information and ideas whenever safely possible. Avoid situations and people where you may be in danger. Take any opportunity you can to talk.

And mind you, I'm talking about religious people in the USA, within my sphere of vision. I have no experience elsewhere.

[McTraveller]

Yeah that religious view (not unique to the US, by the way) is based on tons of misunderstanding, at least in the Christian sphere of thought.

Spoiler: TLDR (click to show/hide)

The problem is often that the vocal Christians are indoctrinated with a poor understanding of scripture and the nature of sin. I forget the '-ology' for it, the "study of sin".  What people forget is that "being an X" is not sinful, but it's a result of living in a fallen world.  X here is "anything that doesn't put God first." It can be putting your sexual identity first, it can be being a narcissist, it can be self-righteousness, it can be being gluttonous, any number of things.

Sadly people missed the boat and for some reason singled out this particular sexuality-related tendency instead of keeping it in the context of all the other sins. I mean even in the "favorite" Romans 1 verses that are cited, the sexual sins are last in a long list - and it is the practice not the tendency anyway.  And mostly it's about "putting what feels good for you first", not about the particular tendencies people have.

So short story - having a particular sexual orientation is no more or less sinful than being prone to being a drunk or philanderer or gambler or too interested in sports or money or... the point is that everyone is a sinner, and there is no hierarchy of "deadliness" of sins (dammit middle ages!) - except for "blaspheming the Holy Spirit*".  The only hierarchy is in the effect of sinful behavior - how many people don't live fruitful lives because of a particular tendency.

It's also why there is so much in Jesus' words about "death to self" - the most important thing isn't what makes you feel good or makes you happy, the most important thing is putting God and others first.  And by that metric, hating and oppressing people with different gender expression is to be admonished.  On the other hand, putting your gender expression as "the most important thing" is also to be admonished.

*Most scholarship says that doesn't mean saying "Jesus Christ" or "God dammit" or whatever.  It means attributing something to God which is against the nature of God.  So basically all the things that caricature "the religious right" - they claim they are right in the name of God, but I'm sad to say that they appear to be at risk of being told "away with you, I never knew you."

I second the notion that you can't have reasoned discourse about it when being physically threatened though.

[brewer bob]

I hope I won't regret participating in this discussion... But here goes:

But when it is safe, it is a far better approach to go "You are wrong. I am not what you think. I am this and this. I do not wish for us to be enemies." especially if we are talking about a random person with no history of actual evil acts (and there are a big distance between doing evil acts, advocating for evil acts, and merely having stupid prejudices)

In the case of an ignorant bigot and not an actual fascist, sure, they might change their mind. But it should never be expected (nor be the responsibility) of persons whom the hate targets. It's not their job to educate bigots.

Outright fascists/nazis on the other hand should be denied all platforms to spread their hate and recruit new folk into their ranks. Again, this won't make them change their minds or go away, but it will make it harder for them to grow their numbers. (Nor does it touch the underlying issues of what cause the rise of fascism, but that's a much larger topic.)

The worst is when borderline fascists are invited to some political debates on TV with, let's say members of minorities, so that "both sides" will be represented. At least here this kind of shit has contributed very much to the normalizing of racist language (which would've been unthinkable ~15 years ago). Now even larger media outlets use certain terms coined from said fascists. This has been part of the tactics the new wave of the fascism/nazism (of the 2000s): participate in public debates, no matter what the topic derail it and start talking about immigration (for example).

Gotta attack the ideology of oppression against LGBTQ with information and ideas whenever safely possible. Avoid situations and people where you may be in danger. Take any opportunity you can to talk.

Also, as a reminder for those who participate in online debating/confronting with the fash: make sure your online persona can't be connected to your real life person. Those pieces of shit collect information about people on the "wrong side" (and have acted upon it).

[Dunamisdeos]

I hope I won't regret participating in this discussion... But here goes:

In the case of an ignorant bigot and not an actual fascist, sure, they might change their mind. But it should never be expected (nor be the responsibility) of persons whom the hate targets. It's not their job to educate bigots.

Outright fascists/nazis on the other hand should be denied all platforms to spread their hate and recruit new folk into their ranks. Again, this won't make them change their minds or go away, but it will make it harder for them to grow their numbers. (Nor does it touch the underlying issues of what cause the rise of fascism, but that's a much larger topic.)

I completely agree with all of this, 100%. But I'd like to posit that while it is definitely unfair to say that an LGBTQ person should not have to be (Edit: primarily) responsible for educating people... there's not really another avenue for it to come from. It's not fair for someone to have to justify their own existence in that way, but this kind of fighting has to be done. I do what I can as a straight dude who has gained some relative understanding on the subject, but I'm never going to be the same as someone with a horse in the race, as it were.
 
Also, it's oddly fitting for this to tangent be discussed on a thread about social media, where a lot of this is perpetuated/echoed.

[Cathar]

Snoop

A couple opinions I have on the topic :
• It is not the job of a persecuted minority to educate bigots. True. But it is the job - I'd say even the only job- of activists. While I was politically active in the (radical?) left, everyone I worked with was far too pure to soil their hands with discussing with hostiles or neutral parties - so in the end, they remained among themselves and for the group I was on, infighted to their way to dissolution.
"It's not my job to educate them" is a sentence that I have heard verbatum from activists. Not their job ? Then what is ?
• Medias are absolutely complicit in the rise of fascism, and have been as long as I can remember. Even in old political debates from the 90', you had public figures protesting against that specific tendency. I think it was either Desproges or Servat who said something like that "they put a jew and an antisemite in the same room, and call it a balanced debate". But the era of mediatic monopoly is at its end. Activism now mostly occur on social medias, and we are under no obligation to leave the final word to the establishment.
• No matter what you do, remain anonymous. Doesn't matter where you stand on the political spectrum. Being nameless is your best protection against persecution.

[heydude6]

Snoop

A couple opinions I have on the topic :
• It is not the job of a persecuted minority to educate bigots. True. But it is the job - I'd say even the only job- of activists. While I was politically active in the (radical?) left, everyone I worked with was far too pure to soil their hands with discussing with hostiles or neutral parties - so in the end, they remained among themselves and for the group I was on, infighted to their way to dissolution.
"It's not my job to educate them" is a sentence that I have heard verbatum from activists. Not their job ? Then what is ?

This is gold!

A key thing to take away from this though is that not all minorities are activists, and they don't have to be. If you are not committed to spreading the word of your cause, then you are fully within your right to kick someone out of your sight for saying inappropriate things. You're allowed to say "I'm too tired to deal with this shit" without further explanation, and sometimes it's even necessary if the asshole is persistent enough to drive even the most reasonable man to insanity.

[brewer bob]

"It's not my job to educate them" is a sentence that I have heard verbatum from activists. Not their job ? Then what is ?

I wholeheartedly agree with this. I've had similar experiences when I was still active in the local "scene". Really frustrating discussions, infighting and such, but I won't delve further into that.

[EuchreJack]

Spoiler: Get real (click to show/hide)

LOL
So good, so good