• Zozano
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    3
    arrow-down
    3
    ·
    edit-2
    6 months ago

    “Defund the police”

    “Black people cannot be racist”

    “Trans women are women”

    I’m sure we’re actually all on the same page, with the exception of how valuable we consider the optics of these slogans.

    I see right wingers present these slogans as evidence of our mental deficiencies.

    They are either convinced we are stupid, or are trying to convince others we are stupid. We have given them ammo.

    To this point, people have claimed they’ll have ammo regardless, but I’m not so sure. People detransition from the (alt)right every day.

    The more sensible we appear, the easier it is for them to consider whether they were justified in what they believed in the first place.

    • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      2
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      6 months ago

      I’m okay with defund the police because it doesn’t say “totally defund the police” because it’s so often explained as “stop letting them buy literal tanks” and “regulate or reform police spending”

      I’m okay with “trans women are women” because trans becomes a modifier of women, so it’s an accurate description.

      “Black people cannot be racist” makes no logical or practical sense and I have the same reaction to this phrase as I would if somebody told me “black people cannot eat ice cream”.

      • Zozano
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        6 months ago

        The problem with all of them is that they lack nuance.

        Sure, they can be used as incindiary and provocative statements to initiate conversation or oust someone, but more often than not, the words are not crossing the aisle.

        When the left says “defund the police” the right hears “completely strip the police of all money” (I have actually seen leftists make the claim that this is not hyperbole).

        When the left says “trans women are women” we mean “the definition of woman has changed from biological to cultural” but what the right hears is “accept our assertion that trans women are biological women or be branded a transphobe”.

        When the left says “black people cannot be racist” they mean “racism is mired in oppression. It’s a waste of time trying to address biases towards white people because they aren’t in a position to be opresssed” - but the right hears “black people are hypocrites”.

        None of this shit does any good to making the world better. It doesn’t bridge a divide, it widens it.

        On a similar note, did you hear the news about that “tik tok trad wife” who said the n-word? People found her employer and got her fired.

        Good job dickheads, now she’s doing the rounds on Fox News, Alex Jones, Tucker Carlson etc.

        Jordan Peterson, same deal. Brett Weinstein, same deal.

        The left need to stop making these people.

        • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          6 months ago

          Don’t argue with the right or left, and don’t use their slogans is good advice.

          Have a valid perspective and stand up two individuals in defense of that perspective.

          Problems arise when one takes the shortcut of chanting a slogan instead of saying what they actually mean.

          Jordan Peterson made his own bed, that guy never sounded rational or balanced to me. I was confused how people were convinced by him until I found out that he used to be a preacher and listened to the rhythms of his speech. I can see how people can be tricked by that.

          Publicly exclaiming racial slurs is gonna to get you dumped from society. I think people using slurs are assholes anyway, and using them on a public forum is about as aware a form of expression as taking a nap on railroads tracks.

          • Zozano
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            6 months ago

            Jordan Peterson would still be confined to influencing a small group of uni students if there weren’t protests to remove him from his tenured position at the university he was teaching at. (Regarding the Canadian trans bill)

            The protestors who got him fired made him into a global figure.

            People who use racial slurs are assholes for sure. The point I was getting at is that the left keeps thinking they can break these twats, but it reliably backfires.

            Another example: Dave Chapelle.

            If people just ignored him then he wouldn’t have milked multiple standup specials for the one subject.

            • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              6 months ago

              Didn’t Peterson get his fame from his YouTube channel?

              I don’t follow him much at all.

              I see what you’re saying though.

              You have to call people out on their shit, also.

              There has to be some happy medium between calling people out when they’re being awful, which seems necessary to advance society, and hounding them relentlessly.

              I feel like I draw that line exactly where too many other people agree with you.

              If you take the initiative to report that woman for using a racial slur, that’s at least as valid(I’d argue more valid) an action as that woman semantically broadening a racial slur.

              But if you read a report about how she got fired for using a racial slur, and is being condemned, and then decide to go after her, then you’re just wasting time, discrediting your perspective, and kicking a horse while it’s shot.

              Problem is that people like to fight battles after they’re already won, because they’re easier to be a part of then.

              If everybody is agreeing with you, you probably don’t need to keep saying what you’re saying.

              • Zozano
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                arrow-down
                1
                ·
                6 months ago

                I think Peterson had a YouTube audience before he got fired, but his lectures then were mostly mundane ramblings about philosophy and psychology.

                I think it’s fine to call people out on their shit, but too many people see themselves as the arbitors of justice, with no room for rehabilitation or recourse.

                The dumbest thing about the Dave Chapelle protests outside Netflix was the entitlement. They wanted to keep their subscriptions while demanding Dave gets kicked off.

                They had it backwards. The correct course of action is to stop supporting Netflix and encourage others to do so.

                For the consumer to demand that the publisher punishes the performer, so the consumer can continue to utilise the platform is just so spineless.

                It’s like protesting nestle. “Stop poisoning baby formula in third world countries, so I don’t feel morally bankrupt from buying your bottled water”

                • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  ·
                  6 months ago

                  Did the Chappelle thing go anywhere? I thought it was DOA, although I’m not familiar with the controversy at all.

                  He made trans jokes? Or jokes about how he didn’t understand transsexuals?

                  At least with Nestle. There’s a lot of actual corporate litigation going after the itself for utilizing child slavery.

                  Hasn’t worked yet in legal forums, but there’s definitely a concerted effort to place the blame on the bad actor itself, whether an individual or in this case, the company itself.

                  But the protestors identified Chappelle as the bad actor in his case right, so they didn’t want to penalize the entire platform for one bad actor?

                  Boycotting all of YouTube instead of protesting the specific offensive YouTuber responsible for his own words doesn’t make sense to me.

                  Like Nestle should be held accountable because The company is actively fighting for the retention of child slavery in their cocoa plantations to support their business operations.

                  I don’t know what Netflix"s culpability would have been related to Dave Chappelle, a fraction of a fraction of a percent of their content and business model.