Yeah, which is why I take a lot more care not to be racist than not to be loud.
fucking snowflakes
Once again, being called racist is so much worse than actually holding racist positions and supporting racist ideologies.
So basically the defense is, “I’m not a racist but I just believe racist things”.
New flash, we are all racists. It’s impossible not to be after being raised in a systemically racist culture. Am I a racist isn’t a question. The only question that remains is what am I going to do about it?
And for what it’s worth, this isn’t new “woke” ideas. I’ve been learning about this exact idea since I was in high school, in the early 1980s.
This exchange between BigT and mikecurtis captures the essence of what I dislike about the Straight Dope in 2021 and what has been lost from the glory days.
BigT has decided that certain topics are beyond the Pale and not suitable for discussion. Anyone who wants to discuss a topic where the population is still about evenly divided or, worse, where BigT’s opinion is still the minority opinion, is a bigot and ‘not worthy of respect in democratic society’ (Maya Forstater v Centre for Global Development, 2019).
As a result, folks like BigT left move in smaller and smaller circles and get exposed less and less to opinions that are different from their own. Fighting ignorance becomes so much more difficult if the only people you are willing to talk to are the ones that you already agree with.
Back in the day, I used to get angry hearing the frankly appalling view of folks like Shodan and Bricker but this Burn the Bigot attitude and the assumption that anyone who disagrees with you must be a bigot make for very sterile debate. My sense is that folks like BigT are winning the battle for dominance here and the mission to fight ignorance has been cast aside. I think that’s a shame.
I think the thing you’re underestimating is how much it is true that everyone else left. This is the majority now. The smugness and the hostility to slight differences of opinion has always been here. What used to be here in quantity, and is not anymore to anything like the same degree, is substance. Whereas you would always have a bunch of people ratpacking other posters, trying to bait each other into breaking a rule, and then whining about the moderation that resulted, back then that was mostly happening in the context of some form of expertise being brought to bear on the subject at hand. Like for every 3 posts that Diogenes would post that looked just like all the other cheapshots at whatever right-winger was defending Rush Limbaugh or some shit, he would have one where he went to the original Greek and actually took someone to school. Maybe that was more like 9 to 1 by the end.
Or like when Bricker or whatever the other guys’ names were tried to throw their weight around and try to argue conservative principles from a legal point of view, yes, it was always true that 20 people would call him a psychopath, a liar, and so on, and he would cry and moan about the double standards and the hive mind, and everyone would be kinda right and kinda wrong, but then the 21st person would be Richard Parker, who would hammer nail after fucking nail into the coffin of the legal argument itself. It would be a serious confrontation of ideas, with also a peanut gallery of people saying Republicans are monsters / liberals are babies/ all other posters but me are mentally ill, etc. The sort of exceptionalism that posters here have always applied to themselves was warranted at one point. Now the exceptionalism is still present, but the things that merited it are not. The balance shifted, and the place became what the people who stuck around wanted it to become, which is not the place you’ve described.
I gave this question short shrift yesterday, and I wanted to give a more thoughtful answer.
I believe that intent plays a significant role here. You can do and say bigotted things without being a bigot.
I’ll use myself as an example. As a man, who is not misogynistic, I have done and said things that are offensive to women. Because of cultural programming, ignorance, misguided attempts at humor…so many reasons.
This does not relieve me of my responsibility; I have done and said misogynous things. And that is wrong. But it does not define me as a misogynist. I hold no Ill will towards women. I believe men and women should be equal.
There will be those who say that it’s a distinction without a difference. If it walks like a duck…
But I believe it’s an important distinction. If you automatically group all bigotted actions as coming from bigots you miss an important part of the problem. That alot of bigotry is systemic. And the cure for systemic bigotry is not the same as the cure for overt bigotry.
The question remains: what is your response when someone says “You are a bigot”? If you go, “Yeah, that was pretty bigoted of me, but in my heart, I recognize women have rights as human beings, and I was raised in a pretty fucked-up household, so I slipped up there,” then fine. But most bigots pull out the “How dare you call me a foul name like ‘bigot,’ you prejudiced progressive twat…” card, and we’re off to the races.
I think there is a difference between playing “you are a bigot” as your first card and playing it as your final card.
If you always play it as your first card, you are going to be calling a lot of people ‘bigot’ and the number of people whose opinions you hear will shrink. Eventually, you’ll look at out at a world where everyone except you and your in-group is a bigot. You will have become what you despise.
Everybody has his own response to being accused of practicing bigotry. One (that I have contempt for) is to say, “How dare you” or in the alternative, as you are doing, “Is THAT your first response? To accuse others of the bigotry that you, on some level, hold in your own heart? Then I say YOU are the true bigot here, not I. Ha hahahahaha!!”
The challenge is that for a lot of people, that’s exactly how it works. People just cannot seem to grasp the idea that Ted from next door might be an awesome neighbour, polite, actively involved with the school PTA, and spend time volunteering at a homeless shelter, but because he’s got a conservative bent on some trendy issue like transgender rights, he’s an asshole by virtue of the fact he has the “wrong” viewpoint - as @mikecurtis has aptly pointed out in his examples.
It’s not just an SDMB issue though, it’s a problem in society more generally and it’s gotten a lot worse over the years - on both sides.
How about, “I disagree - I don’t think my position is bigoted.”?
I agree. People have forgotten that there’s politics - and there’s real life. Personally, I’ve known plenty of assholes who agree with me, and plenty of wonderful people whose opinions are diametrically opposed to my own. I also know which of the two groups I’d rather hang out with.
I disagree that this is a valid response.
So you, personally, are the final arbiter on what is bigoted and what isn’t?
No, of course not. I’m just trying to point out how your response is a deflection.
Tell me WHY you think you’re not a bigoted fuck–give me your reasoning process so I can tear it apart and show you (well, not you–show the world) why you ARE a bigoted fuck.
Shouldn’t the person making the accusation bear the burden of proof? If you accuse someone of bigotry, you should first explain why you think the person is a bigoted fuck.
How about I don’t give a fuck what a bigot wants from me? If you, a bigoted asshole, wants to know why I think you’re a bigot, you can explain your position beyond “I don’t think calling people niggers is bigoted” or you can go piss off. I’d much rather you piss off than subject me to your tedious reasoning, but I’ll allow you to begin your tedious tortured explanation before I piss off on you.
BTW, it should be clear, but in case it’s not, I am NOT saying that Alessan is a bigot–that’s supposed to be a purely hypothetical, general “you” above.
It doesn’t matter if you think the word should mean that and only that. Most people use the word to mean much more intentional and/or unreflective actions and attitudes. So if you call someone that, they will hear, and you may even subtly think in your mind, of the stronger version of the word even if you are trying not to. It’s impossible not to after being raised in a culture that uses the word like that.
Wow. Does that come up in conversation around here a lot?