Edit: I didn’t actually think I’d need to put this here but unfortunately I think those kinds of people are here
Bigots are not welcome on my post and they are certainly not welcome on my post to co-opt it to spread bigotry
I am progressive myself and support human rights and LGBTQ+ people
A frequent frustration is recursive guilt-by-association.
“Yeah so okay we do align on everything however you refuse to denounce your friend who didn’t really do anything but he is a fan of a controversial figure who also didn’t really say or do much but they are friends with a bad person so… Get lost?”
Another is translation based on the assumption that one’s assumptions are universal.
“You said you think Terry Davis was a technical genius for his OS. Honestly his work is nothing compared to a modern OS. I think so so therefore you must think so, and so you must mean something else. What you are really praising is his extremist christianity.”
The latter one is more of a human trait. That’s why basically every conservative will immediately suspect you pf something if you start badmouthing religions (at least their religion), even with totally accurate critique they happen to not know much about.
That I don’t do that by default and get caught so off guard is one of the most infuriating things about autism. Just say your thoughts damnit
Purity testing.
If you don’t align with the party narrative 100%, down to the atom, then you’re basically maga.
I don’t think people realize this is a major factor that drives people away from progressive politics.
When a conservative meets someone more conservative, they bitch about liberals. When a leftist meets someone more left than them they compete with each other to see who’s most “pure.”
This is a major problem.
And if you point this out to progressive people as to nobody likes them and how offputting/alienating they are. You are clearly MAGA or voted for Trump. Clearly if only you were ‘enlightened’ like them you’d 100% agree with them and have no separate ideas, opinions, or life experience of your own.
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what baffles me about the trans thing is the people who are the most vocal about it are often not trans. they are often cis people who claim to speak for all trans people as if they are a monolith. IME of trans people… they are not a monolith. they are just people with a whole range of beliefs. and some trans folks are anti-progressive/elitist as fuck.
As a trans but Closeted person myself I hate when non trans allies speak over us for us without letting us actually speak and allies of other minorities speaking over the minorities they claim to support in the first place without letting that minority be involved is an actual problem
Constantly. Usually it takes the form of reducing topics to binary choices and/or purity tests.
- “You’re either with me or against me / You’re either part of the solution or part of the problem”
- Where “part of the solution” means doing exactly, and only exactly what they think you should be doing.
- “If you don’t satisfy all of my impossible requirements, you’re
as bad asa nazi” - “We only agree on 99 out of 100 things, so clearly you’re not to be trusted”
- etc
i really have never encountered someone like this.
unless the ‘purity test’ is being anti genocide or pro trans rights. you know, basic fundamental shit.
Genocide is a term that is both over and under used. There are currently about six genocides ongoing. I don’t see the point in trying to call someone out on it because no one is actually doing anything for or against it outside of a very small number of people.
If someone asks me if I’m anti genocide I assume they mean something they specifically consider a genocide and they are trying to use this as bait to get me to out myself in some way. They don’t actually expect I’m personally participating or countering it in any way.
Trans rights also is a loaded term now because there are a LOT of individual rights Trans people are needing to fight for all in parallel. It’s better to be specific.
Sure someone who says they are against trans people is awful, but I find folks set the bar in different places and use that to start an argument. The easiest example is, what age should someone be allowed to transition which is an intensely challenging question to answer even on a medical level.
Yeah, the comment above is kind of a hilarious example of cognitive dissonance. “I’ve never seen purity tests, other than these tests for ensuring purity”. Blanket statements like that are rarely used in good faith.
You’re all making generalities out of assumptions here…
There’s no assumption. They literally listed two purity tests that they themselves use, directly after saying that they never see anyone use purity tests
Their purity test: You must not deny genocide.
What you heard their purity test was: They must accept that any and all genocides that I think exist are real and a big problem.
Again, you fucking morons are inferring things that aren’t there just to try and be witty, while utterly missing the point…
Congratulations on failing your reading comprehension test.
You’ve got a bunch of nutjobs that will turn that phrasing into a white genocide conversation is the problem.
The second part of that is that genocide is a subjective term due to classification of ethnic groups being subjective.
Honestly this well encapsulates the problem I tend to have aligning on goals with other progressives and some liberals. Every time folks try to simplify something as complex as genocide down to a yes or no question it means they are already invalidating the majority of positions and forcing a conversation of agree with me or call me wrong. That isn’t how it works, that isn’t how discussion and debate work. Forcing people into Yes/No thinking doesn’t lead to progress, asking for people to think critically does.
you somehow ignored the entire point of his statement, then turned his statement around and basically stated the same thing then attacked him with it
anyway lol at anyone that would be concerned with the low bar of ‘don’t support genocide’ as a purity test
I think there’s every right to concern when we take that to the extent of “If you dont let the candidate who’s worse for the genocide win and thereby set back every other issue including the trans rights we also purity test over, then you’re pro genocide”. There’s a right way to do that shit and harm reduction is worthwhile
fair but that’s not supporting genocide
anyone conflating choosing for with getting along with is being mentally dishonest
yeah i agree about both issues.
in both cases people do not care about the issue. they care about using it as soapbox to bully other people and feel morally superior.
they do not care about the actual people either.
You should just be forward with which perceived genocide you don’t qualify as a genocide so that people can decide whether there’s an validity to what you’re saying. Which genocides are we purity testing over that aren’t really genocides?
i encounter people like this on a daily basis.
but i went to a liberal arts school, graduate school, and work in the non-profit world where teh trust fund purity types are quite common.
rarely are they ever the type of person who has ever had to be responsible for themselves or anyone else.
There are thick, uncrossable lines, and there are a lot of people who don’t mind crossing them. You cannot compromise with a bigot. You cannot find common ground with a person who would subjugate you, or someone who sees you as less than human.
We can have disagreements about many political issues, but when you are standing next to pedophiles, rapists, fascists, and bigots, you shouldn’t be surprised to be called a Nazi.
So the question becomes, what is the test of “purity”?
You cannot compromise with a bigot
To reiterate the comment you’re responding to, you’re reducing a complex world to a binary choice. Everyone that has ever existed is bigoted to some degree, therefore no compromise is possible ever?
Bull, and I cannot emphasize this enough, shit. Everyone is not a little bit bigoted. That’s something bigots tell themselves when rationalizing their own prejudices. You should probably take a hard look in the mirror and ask yourself if you’re the problem.
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Their example of bigots was racists and nazis plus pedos (which isn’t bigotry but universally frowned upon). They did NOT say, “any and all bigots, even of minor things”.
Why are you trying to make them say something they did not say?
You are part of the problem. When someone says, “I like pancakes”, what they SPECIFICALLY DID NOT SAY is, “I hate waffles”.
Similarly, when someone says, “you cannot compromize with nazis and bigots”, what they DID NOT say was, “any concervative deserves the death penalty”. Why do you read it as such?
I quoted an entire sentence exactly. They didn’t say “I like pancakes”, they said “You can’t compromise with waffle-eaters”
English must be so hard for you when you utterly fail to understand how assumptions work. Good job being a piece of shit contributing to the problem you’re attempting to be above.
- “You’re either with me or against me / You’re either part of the solution or part of the problem”
In American leftism there is a definite divide between black and white.
For example second wave feminism is often thought of as Women seeking entry into the workplace, but at the same time black feminists were trying to leave the workforce and take care of their own kids.
The labor movement has an explicitly racist history. A fact that Capitalists often took advantage of by leveraging black scabs who were often ineligible for union membership. Eugne Debs identified this as a problem with the socialist movement.
I’m not saying that racism is common among today’s lefties, just that white lefties are often ignorant of black American life and especially black radical thought and activism.
If you are vexed by Bernie Sanders’ struggle with black voters, you’re probably not very familiar with this history.
The question then becomes, how exactly is a white leftist supposed to appeal to them in situations like voting
Yes, I have a friend who is extremely progressive but is still very much a slut shamer. She really looks down with disgust on women who like sex or have more boyfriends than she deems acceptable.
She also shows bigotry against other groups of people. Although she would never in a million years look down on someone because of their skin colour, she absolutely takes on a tribalistic Us vs Them mentality for other reasons. An example is the war in Ukraine started by Russia. Did Russia start it? Yes. Is Putin evil? Yes. Are there many Russians who support this war? Yes. BUT… not every Russian person in the world is inherently evil, not all of them want this, many are victims trapped in a system that will literally throw them out the god damned window if they dissent. And my friend absolutely fucking hates Russians. All of them. No empathy about the nightmare situation so many of them are stuck in. It has gotten so bad that she has literally started to hate her chickens that are a Russian breed. She has started assigning negative human traits to them and is insisting that they are negative and bad because they are Russian chickens. It’s honestly getting ridiculous.
Holy shit, I would unironically start trolling her… Give her chickens Jewish names so when she starts badmouthing them, she might have a clue she’s just being a bigot, exactly like Nazis in that respect of, “everyone of a group I don’t like is guilty”.
I’d start giving her nicknames of officers that stood over concentration camps if she continued.
Yes, I have a friend who is extremely progressive but is still very much a slut shamer. She really looks down with disgust on women who like sex or have more boyfriends than she deems acceptable.
I had forgotten about this kind of problem and I absolutely hate it
It reminds me of progressive people who want to ban anything lewd or sexual because it’s a “problem”
Or shaming women and LGBTQ+ people for liking sexual or lewd things and claiming it harms them, have these people even browsed the internet because there’s a whole culture of women and LGBTQ+ people liking lewd and sexual stuff and even creating it
I’ve even seen some progressive people shame LGBTQ+ and female creators of lewd and sexual content because it’s “harmful”
It’s not just men who like and create lewd and sexual stuff
This reminds me of someone who hates Chinese people because of COVID. It’s such a strange way to think.
politics and personal behavior are two different things.
unless she thinks the government should shame/ban/whatever people’s sexual habits, then it’s political.
So it’s only discriminatory if it’s being perpetrated by the government?
you discriminate every goddamn day. what people say, how they look, what they wear. that’s fine.
it’s not fine for governments to do that unless you are a fan of totalatarianism.
So it depends how you define progressive.
As a PoC I have certainly witnessed racism from white, black and Hispanic liberals. At its worst the democratic party can feel like a clubhouse for non regressive white people and the largest minority groups in the country. No one else really has a seat at the table. Is that really progressive?
I’ve moved on to assessing peoples worldview as either inclusionary or exclusionary. Unfortunately most people, left or right, have an exclusionary world view.
Exclusionary here means a failure to acknowledge the universal sanctity of human dignity. Nearly everyone is focused on themselves or their group exclusively. Some in ways that are more harmful than others.
Can’t agree with you enough.
What kills me about the DEI stuff… is it’s only considered ‘inclusive’ of atheist liberal colleges educated types… for some reason their ‘diversity’ always excludes economic, age, and religious diversity.
I put a poster up for a women/trans/non-binary inclusive group in an anarchist cafe, with their approval, only to get a literal essay from the cafe the next day about the miss-use of a word pertaining to our trans inclusivity. I can’t recall what the “right” word was supposed to be, and the poster’s verbiage was already researched/reviewed by trans people in the group. Due diligence was done.
Queue people leaving the group because we didn’t feel it was necessary to print new posters. They felt we should be less hostile to “people taking the time to educate.” Yeah, I made a few comments.
But you know what? I much prefer that to the kind of shit I had to deal with in conservative spaces. I worked on a couple political campaigns, had back room discussions where people don’t “educate” when you’re not one of them, they insult and back-stab you.
I can at least see the essay as an attempt to share knowledge, to include rather than exclude, even if it was from a place of self-importance and ignorance.
The friction I see in progressive spaces is usually about making things more equitable. It can be poorly thought out, but no one’s perfect. I prefer flawed inclusivity to hostile exclusivity.
Absolutely. No one hates the left more than slightly different brands of the left.
Just head on over to the FuckCars community. Tons of ableism in there to witness.
Yeah, that’s generally the issue with a ‘Fuck<whatever>’ mentality.
Not “YayTransit” or something, but just relentless bemoaning cars and all who dare to use them. Such a community approach may serve the circle-jerk of those in agreement, but doesn’t really do anything to change the status quo closer to what they want.
Walkable stuff is nice, as is transit as it works so I’m on board for improvements to make that more feasible, but it’s kind of off putting the way they counduct themselves a good amount of the time.
Like?
Assuming everyone lives in a city where the weather is mild, the distances to things are short, there is reliable public transportation, and has significant infrastructure in place for walking/biking. Also assuming that everyone using a car instead of biking/walking is just being lazy, without spending a second to consider the elderly or infirm.
Assuming everyone lives in a city where the weather is mild, the distances to things are short, there is reliable public transportation, and has significant infrastructure in place for walking/biking
Could you elaborate about what you mean here? It appears to me as if the people participating in fuck cars are more bemoaning the lack of these things. The people frequenting that comm will be the first to complain that the vast majority of Americans have abysmal choices for non-automobile transportation.
Also assuming that everyone using a car instead of biking/walking is just being lazy, without spending a second to consider the elderly or infirm
This, I just simply dont see in that comm. I feel like the people in fuck cars comm would be the first ones to argue that the elderly and infirm are oftentimes the first ones to suffer due to lack of good public transportation options. Casting the fuck cars community as ableist and ignorant to the struggles of the disabled seems unfair - given how the mass transit community are some of the primary champions of low floor trams, paratransit, accessible stations with elevators, designated priority seating, etc…
I got banned from there for calling out their bullshit.
sure I was an asshole, but those people are so far up their own asses I didn’t think they’d notice.
I’ve disagreed with the whole fuck cars movement because it introduces more problems that are absolutely not worth having and they are ignorant of a lot of things
I’m also introverted and autistic and I like having my alone space when I need it, I don’t hate interacting with people but I only like interacting with people when I feel like it
Cars allow for that alone time where I can he alone when I want to and getting rid of cars and having to be forced to ride public transport would make that worser
If you see a polite obviously rural person who has not said anything remotely questionable, a common comment is “but you probably wouldn’t want to know their political opinion” or “you probably don’t want their take on minorities or women”. To be folksy is to guarantee progressives brand them as right wing racist sexist bigots.
most rural people i’ve met the past decade where moderate or progressive. they just tend to be more libertarian than city folk are comfortable with, because they are not used to government services being ubiquitous. and they understand that they won’t get shit from the government the way city people take for granted.
And to be fair it’s often true, but I try my best to judge people by their behavior not by stereotypes.
Oh yeah big time. I see it primarily in discussions about religion. Progressive people like to act as though any Christian has the same mentality as the Westboro Baptist church cult. Its a real bummer.
“Progressive” describes a position, not a person. A person can be many things. A person can hold contradictory viewpoints, and fully believe two incompatible thoughts at the same time. It’s tragically naive to assume that people are rational or consistent.
Can a person think they are progressive and also be a bigot? Of course a person can. Everybody is the hero in their own story.
I have a lot of first hand experience with it via dating. In terms of outward Appearance and how I present I am an average looking straight cis white male. Mentally, in addition to being on the spectrum, that’s not really how I identify or am wired though. If anything, I’m probably more lesbian based on who I seem to get along with and am attracted to, lol.
As I am sure we are all (hopefully) aware there are a lot of men with very problematic behaviors (which is an entire other complex topic). As a result, within the liberal sphere I exist in it is very socially acceptable to shit on or otherwise have a negative bias against people that present like I do in a way that would not be acceptable if it were against another social group because of what they are.
I have had a number of interactions and conversations where my point of view/input/feelings/etc. were more or less dismissed or ignored by women when if I were a woman saying the exact same thing it wouldn’t be. I have also had people flat out say “that’s a very man thing to say” as a when what I am saying conflicts with their world view or how they feel and they can’t engage with it logically anymore.
Please note, I am leaving a ton of intricate context out of the above to try and avoid having to write a novel. I understand why women have the bias/reaction towards men who present like I do, and why it’s necessary. In the examples I am thinking of, these are women who know me, not strangers or randos. When discussing things I do my absolute best to have conversations in good faith and on the merits/logic of what is being said.
I don’t like pulling the autism card or saying that’s just how I feel, but I find that people are so unused to interacting with someone like me, rather than engage in the nuance of my experience and how it very much contradicts their world view, it’s much easier for them to find a reason to be dismissive of it. I also realize that from a third party perspective without any context my autistic behavior is indistinguishable from gas lighting.
don’t even get me started on how homophobic most ‘progressive’ women are. I’m straight and cis and white… but holy shit the disgusting things I’ve heard so called ‘liberal feminist’ women say about bi/gay men is vomit-inducing. but as for lesbians or trans women… they are perfect angels. trans men however, are traitors to their divine femininity or something.
they also love nothing more than to cry about how gender roles oppress them, but they cling to these 1950s expectations of men. i do not understand the obsession with 1950s gender roles so many women have. we’re basically supposed to be unfeeling ATMs that make them feel ‘protected’ from the ‘dangers’ of the world… by which they mean minorities and poor people.
I refrained from talking about the gender role thing because per the post title it didn’t seem like a prejudice perse, even if related. It’s also a topic I always try and preface with stating that although the symptoms might be fairly plane and apparent the cause is very complex and nuanced and a result of a lot of different societal pressures and influences. Partially because it is very easy to paint someone talking about it as a red pill misogynist if that nuance is ignored. I also try and point out that this ultimately isn’t a gender issue or any other tribalism type thing, but merely a result of human nature. People are shitty sometimes. That’s universal.
In my experience, there are a lot of women that are very vocal about equity and equality, especially in relationships. However it’s often fairly unidirectional. For example they want their partner to be able to do things like cook, laundry, dishes, etc (which I can do, I think that’s part of being a well rounded person), but they don’t have much interest in learning how to do the traditionally male coded household tasks. Or they don’t want to be the one to approach and ask me out, I always have to be the one to pursue. Similarly in the bedroom I have never met a woman who is dominant or willing to try, despite the fact that I am very switchy.
In talking to these people and pointing out how their personal desires and behavior don’t align with their actual decisions and behavior they often default to, that’s just my personal preference.
That’s nice, but who cares? It’s not fair to have it both ways and ultimately feels like another form of pulling the ladder up behind them.
I don’t think it’s that nuanced or complex. They are just hypocritical assholes, but for some reason people refuse to think women or any minority can be a hypocritical assholes. They can. they are just like men in that regard… nobody seems to have an issue with calling out men as being assholes for having hypocritical expectations of women.
Rules apply to everyone else, but themselves. And yes, very much the types who agree with ladder pulling and thinking wealth/education/freedom should only be for the ‘upper classes’ of which they consider themselves to be a part of, and they want nothing to do with the ‘unwashed masses’ who don’t feign enlightenment like they do.
Yeah, tribalism will always be a scourge on mankind
Good examples from others but I also want to bring up microaggressions. Basically, small things that add up, like a white woman gripping her bag tightly when a black man enters an elevator, or a white man crossing the street because a Latino guy is approaching who looks a little “gangy.” Usually they aren’t that progressive (e.g. they support diversity but critical race theory is a bridge too far).
That said, prejudice is something we all have and is part of human nature. It protects us historically from things like snakes and spiders who may not be venomous but on the off chance they are, better safe than sorry. Prejudice leads to stereotypes, stereotypes lead to discrimination. Conscious effort is needed to overcome that, and progressives do that better than not but no one is fully immune to your natural instincts.
I’ll use myself as an example.
There were some guys having an argument in another room, and it got increasingly intense. They were speaking some kind of Arabic. I thought they were genuinely mad at each other, but then one of them mentioned an athlete’s name and started listing what sounded like stats.
While telling this story at a party, I said something like “Arabic is a very angry-sounding language.” I noticed someone’s eyes get large, and I didn’t realize until then how racist I had unintentionally been.
Later, I thought more about it. Any language that you don’t understand sounds bad if people are having an emotionally charged conversation. It didn’t occur to me until then how easy it is to be thoughtless and racially insensitive.
I generally try not to be an asshole, but I messed up big time. I have no idea who he was, but I’ll always be grateful to the guy whose eyes got big. He gave me a much-needed reality check.
“Arabic is a very angry-sounding language.”
Arabic speaker here and this sounds like the most harmless statement of all time. I mean you’re right in that it was probably more about the emotionally charged concepts than Arabic as a language, but still, I think this is one of those “white people getting mad at other white people when the minority in question wouldn’t think much of it” things.
People often say that German sounds angry. It has nothing to do with the skin color or religion of the speakers. I’ve not thought of Arabic as an angry language, but I don’t think that’s a racist statement.
The Klingon language is entirely artificial, it was created to bring an aggressive and war-like alien race to life. You’ll find people referring to it as “Space German.”
I dunno’, unless I hear shouting and those typical inflections of, “I’m REALLY pissed off”, I’ll only ever think an argument in French is going to lead to rough makeup sex.
lol they were definitely invested in the topic. They were shouting and occasionally slamming things around.
Tbf, Mandarin sounds aggressive AF even tho I speak mandarin, every sentence sound like a military command.
Cantoese, on the otherhand, sounds very passive-aggressive and condesending instead.
What I mean is, when I told my mother I wanna jump off a bridge and kms, she told asked me if I want a ride to the bridge, “we can leave right now, the car is outside” (spoken in Cantonese), and then laughs like its funny somehow. Wtf mom?!?
are you talking from the perspective of a native english speaker?
Depends on what “native” means.
I was born in mainland China and lived there until like I was around like 8, I went to primary school there
Then I immigrated to the US and learned Enlish, I now speak English on a native level, I asked my classmates about it and they don’t seem to hear a foreign “accent”, English has become my primary language that surpassed Mandarin which I haven’t spoken for like 15 years (except for like rare occasions when there’s a Mandarin-only new immigrant kid in school or something, but then I struggle to have any meaningful conversation lol), and Cantonese which which I only speak at home, but since relationship with parents and brother is broken, there’s nothing to be said beyond basic conversation, meaning, no deep discussions like politics or philosophy, since I lack the vocabulary.
I can understand most of a Chinese TV show when listening to it, I just automatically convert the words I hear into mentally hearing it in Cantonese (which uses the same Characters) and I kinda understand like 90% of the plot (there’s maybe like a few words I don’t understand). For HK TV, its in Cantonese and slightly easier.
Chinese (Mandarin) TV automatically feels like the atmosphere is more darker and serious, while HK (Cantonese) TV sounds a little more like comedy and more casual, even for stories like cops shows involving serious crimes like terrorism (the show is from a counter-terrorist perspective). Like its much easier to get over a characters death if its in Cantonese, while a Mandarin Dub over the same thing (e.g. Infernal Affairs, the movie) sound more serious.
Same with songs. Mandarin sounds so dark, Cantonese sounds more fun.
Could be because the the sound frequency of mandarin’s 4 tones vs Cantonese’s 6 tones. Mandarin’s tones sounds like it has a lower frequency, Cantonese’s tones sounds like it has higher frequency. Maybe the lower frequency sounds are associated with adults and therefore “more serious”?
Idk tho… not sure if this feeling is universal, perhaps my brain is just wired differently.
