Permanently deleted
I’m a non-binary person who used to be pretty transmedicalist, if not outright transphobic and especially enbyphobic. Part of what brought me around was a de-escalation in the anger around explaining trans issues. When I first became aware of issues around using pronouns and non-binary people in 2012-ish, there was a lot of fury and very little real explaining. Just people berating others over not asking everyone for their pronouns or not understanding things about trans people. I was too scared to ask questions because everyone seemed so ready to jump down others throats and it really soured me, to the point of hanging around hate sites. It wasn’t the only thing that pushed me in that direction but it certainly didn’t push me away from being hateful.
A good part of what helped me come around understand was de-escalation of the anger and a genuine effort to explain things slowly and without judgement. After a while, sites started putting out longer articles about the nuances of trans and non-binary identities, and after I finally broke away from the hate sites, reading those helped me finally get it. I understand some of the anger. I get mad too. But I know from experience that yelling doesn’t help convert anyone.
Even back in the 80s we didn’t excuse bigotry, no matter the age or the history of the person. We maybe didn’t feel as safe calling it out publicly back in the day, but it was certainly discussed. A bigot is a bigot, end of story. There was no excuse for it in 1983- when the ones “from a different time” were young!- and there’s still no excuse for it forty years later.
I saw an after school special called “What If I’m Gay?” from the 80s that was surprisingly progressive and didn’t lean on stereotypes or tropes. My elementary PE teacher was an LGBT+ activist, and we had at least one openly LGBT+ speaker at a school assembly who spoke about acceptance, and I grew up in a small conservative town.
Even Nirvana wrote in the liner notes for one of their albums that sexists and homophobes shouldn’t buy their records or come to their shows.
I didn’t know a lot of openly trans people back then, but that’s because many people didn’t feel safe coming out. Regardless, I can’t imagine having responded with the brand of ignorance and hate we were actively pushing back against.
With that being said, LGBTphobia was certainly commonplace back then, but as you said, there was no excuse. People knew better, but they participated in it anyway.
The entire “different time” excuse is meant to apply to media, not people! Most texts written in the 1700s that include references to people of color are probably going to at least use outdated language, if not straight up racist perspectives, but because it was a different time you’re supposed to acknowledge that it can still impart valuable ideas so long as you take it in context. Taking that scholarly technique and trying to apply it to crotchety assholes real people spouting hate makes me want to explode
This is completely a tangent but Walk on the Wild Side by Lou Reed is a good example of media that is “of it’s time” but had good intentions. He uses a lot of outdated terminology for trans people, but he was dating and living with a trans woman at the time. As well, he uses the term “coloured girls” for his backup singers. But that’s because he was drawing attention to them. He paid his singers proper wages which was a big deal at the time, and was drawing attention to their presence in music in a subversive way.
seizes excuse with all paws and extra-bitey jaws Oh, oh, is it time to talk about “crazy” and “insane” and “dude” and “guy” and “bro?” And apparently we also still have to mention that the r-slur and “ree” are ableist shit too?
…Am seriously fed up with people who seem to know very few words and all of them inappropriate. And yes, treating everyone like a male buddy is inappropriate. And yes, “crazy” still clearly has its association with mental illness. While many people obviously think it means literally anything at any time in any context they also still call people that as a way of suggesting a person’s got mental problems.
I expect I’ll get trolled for this (as always, 'cause people absolutely cannot stand being asked to change or even consider their own behaviour) but I’m sick of how bad this place is about gendered language and slurs in particular, to the point where I assume somecritter I otherwise respect is gonna misgender me and I’ll just immediately delete my account and be done with this place altogether.
Anyway, that’s my lil tiny rant about some of the lack of care I see floating around, which reminds me to point out that it’s not the words that cause problems (outside of straight-up slurs, anyway) but rather how they’re used. Some seem to think there’s some constantly-changing list of banned words but “don’t call me that” means “don’t call me that,” not “you’re going to gaol for not having the latest word list.”
yapyapyap squeek!
Yes, louder!
Someone elsewhere in this thread is suggesting that we’re all obstinate and inherently resistant to change, but … I can’t relate.
The ability to learn from our missteps and prejudices, and subsequently change and grow, is a hallmark of being human. It’s not about education, either. I’ve known people who only went through grade 3 who are not so destructively stubborn. It doesn’t seem like any way to live to tear other people down because I encounter something new to me.
Not sure which post you’re talking about, but in general, yeah. Any kind of excusing of transphobia is 100% not tolerated here. I’m not a mod of this particular community, but please use the report button if you see anything like this happening.
I did report it. The problem is many of these arguments come clothed in the fabric of politeness. Similar to how white nationalists have tried to persuade me by calling me “brother” and speaking kindly, it might not be immediately apparent to someone why these arguments are harmful. After all, the person is being “polite,” and the person who responds appropriately often seems like the unhinged one.
It’s by design.
I did report it. The problem is many of these arguments come clothed in the fabric of politeness.
Yup. And Beehaw is already doing the thing I predicted they’d do back during the Reddit blackouts: They allow polite genocide endorsements but warn/suspend/ban people who tell those people to fuck themselves because we’re not “being nice”. Shocked Pikachu when Beehaw ends up being no different from shit-just-works.
They allow polite genocide endorsements but warn/suspend/ban people who tell those people to fuck themselves because we’re not “being nice”.
if you were going to make this argument and sustain it i’m not sure this thread supports your argument. there are like 20 comments in here telling transphobes to go fuck themselves and exactly one actual ban has been levied total (against a transphobe)
yaps loudly in agreement about how fucked it is that people pointing out a problem get blamed for being the real problem by privileged asshats!
Avoiding “bad words” and “hostility” doesn’t mean a person is good or nice. Sometimes hostility is justified or at the very least has a point.
