# Left: Behind, or Otherwise **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 19, 2023, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782 "2023-08-19T04:37:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/1 "2023-08-19T04:37:50Z")
So many of us crave a world where it doesn’t matter. _“It”_ meaning our difference, the thing that, in this world, has set us apart. Marginalized us. Sexual orientation. Race. Gender identity. Whatever. Raise your hand if you’ve run into people who have told you “Well, then, quit making an issue of it, why don’t you? Just be you! Don’t be so quick to stick a label on yourself. Why does it matter what sex you are, or if you like boys or girls or both, or any of that stuff? Let’s all just be people!” What do you tell them? I totally get the inclination to roll one’s eyes and sigh and say “You just don’t get it”, believe me. But rolling my eyes at them and telling them they don’t get it isn’t likely to expand their understanding. From the snippet of _Within the Box_ I’m reading to my author’s group on Sunday: > “I don’t think none of us really knows what it’s like to be in another > person’s skin”, George says. “But it’s not just because of pride that > I’m always aware of being a Black man. World ain’t gonna let me > forget it. We all have our own shit we have to sort out, but I don’t > think it’s right to make out like seeing people with racial attitudes > is hostile when this happens all the time.” We can’t draw attention to ways in which we’re prevented from “just being people” and make an attempt to change that unless we can describe the pattern and, yes, stick a label on it. Something to call the phenomenon. But yes, to those of you who don’t see why _“it”_ should matter, yeah, it shouldn’t, and glad to hear that to you it doesn’t make any difference, that actually _is_ a good thing, even if you’re annoyingly oblivious about the ways in which the world won’t let us forget about it yet. I’ve often found it useful to compare being genderqueer to being lefthanded. In today’s world, being lefthanded does not marginalize me. I can “just be people” despite being lefthanded. The world does not make an issue of it and draw my attention to it. I’ve never been treated substantially differently from how other people are treated because of being lefthanded. I _do_ still live in a world where being righthanded is the default, the standard assumption. Sign-in sheets at meetings have the pen glued to the wrong side of the clipboard, and I have to stretch the cord awkwardly to write my name on the form. Desks with the little table attached have the tables on the right instead of the left. But you know, these are trivial things; the truth is that it’s simply not a “difference that makes a difference”. Kids in elementary school didn’t invent an array of hostile mean-spirited things to call me because of it. I didn’t grow up hearing hateful epithets that meant “lefthanded person”. I haven’t faced discrimination in employment or housing or banking. Or singled out for special treatment by the police. Politicians aren’t telling voters I’m a threat to their way of life and things need to be done about people like me. But guess what? It wasn’t always like that. Did you know? If I’d been born in the 1800s I might have had the back of my left hand hit with a ruler if my teacher saw me writing with it. It was considered to be the _wrong_ hand. There was judgmental hostility. And if we go back even further, there was a time when it was associated with the devil. Not just wrong in the sense of incorrect, but wrong in the sense of evil. I might have been considered by the community to be morally depraved. It could have affected my ability to work and live and basically “be a person”. It could even have played a role in getting me burned at the stake as a witch! So if I’d been alive back then, it would have been fair to describe myself as a marginalized person for being lefthanded. It would have been legitimate for me to make a political issue of it, to point out that this was unfair and unreasonable. Moving back to the present era, yes, I hope that having an atypical gender identity will someday be no more problematic than being lefthanded is. Maybe people will still make cisgender assumptions about people by default, but it will be no more oppressive than those signature clipboards and desks. But a big part of the process of getting there is drawing attention to how that is not so yet, and testifying to what it’s been like and why it’s unfair and so on. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/2 "2023-08-19T04:47:00Z")
I’m different in lots of ways. Some can be seen, others cannot. I’m a hider and a runner if it gets tense. Just how I am. I’m not gonna draw any attention if I can help it. Should I be ostracized for that? Or can I just carry on in my meek existence? ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/3 "2023-08-19T04:54:44Z")
Beck, I think it isn’t true, entirely, that you hide in the shadows hoping not to be noticed. I think you construct your public persona, which is most likely a sort of caricature of who you actually are, (emphasizing some things, de-emphasizing others), but you’re pretty out there. I do a lot of that too. After all, I don’t totally know who I actually am. I have vulnerabilities I know about but I also have vulnerabilities that are so scary I don’t let myself fully know about. The me that I present to the world as me, the political me, is a bit idealized. I’m good at that; I’m self-immersed and like to be the hero of my own story. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/4 "2023-08-19T04:56:13Z")
In my real life I’m a scared, quiet mouse. I just found a voice here. It surprised me more than you know. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 9:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/5 "2023-08-19T09:59:17Z")
Well, in that case, welcome, Mousie! It’s a good place, ain’t it? (I’ve very much enjoyed your posts and I hope you rejoice in them) ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/6 "2023-08-19T10:37:54Z")
Thx. And I do ---
**Author:** ![saje](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saje/32/3631_2.png) [@saje](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/saje)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 11:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/7 "2023-08-19T11:13:28Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > So many of us crave a world where it doesn’t matter. _“It”_ meaning our difference, the thing that, in this world, has set us apart. Marginalized us. Sexual orientation. Race. Gender identity. Whatever. Yes, very much so. But I don’t really have much experience with it other than being a woman who likes to be my independent, reasonably intelligent self. > [@AHunter3](#): > > Why does it matter what sex you are, or if you like boys or girls or both, or any of that stuff? Let’s all just be people!” This is my feeling; I truly do not care about any of it. That doesn’t sound right - I DO care for those who are marginalized, stigmatized, hated and feared. This is my thought projected at those who insist on criticizing how others live their lives and make racial assumptions. For me it matters not one iota, it’s a point of interest on the same essential plane as having super curly hair, or vivid blue eyes, or being compelled to make art, or being a whiz with numbers. It’s interesting, but it has zero effect on me or my world. It’s what makes you you, and even if it’s fluid and changing, so what? Go explore and learn, and find happiness where you will. > [@AHunter3](#): > > “Well, then, quit making an issue of it, why don’t you? Just be you! Don’t be so quick to stick a label on yourself. I would never EVER say this to someone who is navigating outside the ultra-narrow Straight/White path. There is no possible way I can truly understand what it means to be made to feel Other. As a woman I’ve experienced a bit of misogyny and quite a lot of patriarchal assumption, but no more. I doubt it even scratches the surface of marginalization. It hurts my heart that we can’t just leave other people’s lives alone. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 11:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/8 "2023-08-19T11:19:57Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > Raise your hand if you’ve run into people who have told you “Well, then, quit making an issue of it, why don’t you? Just be you! Don’t be so quick to stick a label on yourself. Why does it matter what sex you are, or if you like boys or girls or both, or any of that stuff? Let’s all just be people!” > What do you tell them? I mostly get pressure to conform. Stand back so a man can hold the door for me, wear makeup, “you would be prettier if”. There’s a reason I spend so much time hanging out with trans, non-binary, and genderqueer people. They don’t expect me to perform femininity. I’m also a Jew, but i grew up in an area where mostly that’s okay. Yeah, i get invited to Christmas parties. Or don’t get invited, even though it’s a mostly secular celebration, because, you know. But mostly it’s like being left-handed, and just not a big deal. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 12:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/9 "2023-08-19T12:12:56Z")
> [@saje](#): > > This is my feeling; I truly do not care about any of it. That doesn’t sound right - I DO care for those who are marginalized, stigmatized, hated and feared. This is my thought projected at those who insist on criticizing how others live their lives and make racial assumptions. > > For me it matters not one iota, it’s a point of interest on the same essential plane as having super curly hair, or vivid blue eyes, or being compelled to make art, or being a whiz with numbers. It’s interesting, but it has zero effect on me or my world. It’s what makes you you, and even if it’s fluid and changing, so what? Go explore and learn, and find happiness where you will. Yup. This is me. Do whatever you want as long as it doesn’t hurt you or others. Why should I care? Whatever floats your boat. But I get very angry at bigots and racists. I do NOT want those people to do whatever they want. I’d like to send them to an island and cut them off from decent society entirely. > [@AHunter3](#): > > Raise your hand if you’ve run into people who have told you “Well, then, quit making an issue of it, why don’t you? Just be you! Don’t be so quick to stick a label on yourself. Why does it matter what sex you are, or if you like boys or girls or both, or any of that stuff? Let’s all just be people!” > What do you tell them? Not sure I understand this. All of my friends are “Just be you” people. I don’t tell them anything. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/10 "2023-08-19T14:39:21Z")
> [@enipla](#): > > Not sure I understand this. To understand it, you need to know the context of it being a cross-post of one of his blog entries. You are seeing one chapter of an ongoing theme where he really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really wants to make an issue of it. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/11 "2023-08-19T14:50:56Z")
Huh. Ok. It’s not an issue with me. Whatever floats your boat is my approach to others. I really don’t care. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/12 "2023-08-19T17:17:38Z")
> [@Beckdawrek](#): > > I just found a voice here. It surprised me more than you know. > [@AHunter3](#): > > It’s a good place, ain’t it? > [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > You are seeing one chapter of an ongoing theme where he really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really wants to make an issue of it. One of the things I like about it is that the support isn’t saccharine. If someone thinks you’re full of shit, they won’t hesitate to tell you so. You may not agree with them when they do, but it kind of leaves you thinking that the supportive comments are genuinely felt, know what I mean? ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/13 "2023-08-19T17:27:07Z")
It’s impossible to get people not to see race, sex, all the many things that delineate and divide us. That would be like demanding that people pretend the emperor is actually wearing clothes. Like it or not, it’s just human to see things that are there, unfortunately. We as a species cannot and will not ever stop seeing what makes us different. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/14 "2023-08-19T21:52:34Z")
We’re all humans. The human condition is we want to be part of a tribe. A pack. Like minded individuals. When you’re not you either shrink and hide or come out screaming, flailing your fists. I’m basically a loner. Inside my head, way too much. But I have a tribe, my family. A pack, people who are friends or helpmates. So I’m not _really_ alone. Yet, I still shrink from a crowd. Can’t speak. And have flight issues. I wanna run. I hope hope hope your experience is better. If it isn’t take steps and change your situation, go where you’re wanted and loved. Life is easier if you don’t always need to swim against the current. Sometimes a tribe or pack can give you rest from that burden. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/15 "2023-08-19T22:31:20Z")
> [@saje](#): > > It’s interesting, but it has zero effect on me or my world. It’s interesting; and the effect it has on me and my world is that it improves both me and my world. It improves me in that it helps cause me to think; and also in that in a world that accepts differences my own differences will be better accepted, which makes such a world both safer and more comfortable for me. This is true even for those “differences” which have during my lifetime been generally accepted as “normal”; but it’s a damn rare person who has no differences that haven’t been considered as weird at some point in their lifetimes, and I’m most certainly not in that category. [ETA: I don’t mean to imply that there aren’t drastic differences in how close people come to fitting whatever is the “normal” template; and also in how easy people find it to appear to fit that template; and also in which differences from the template are taken seriously by a particular society at a particular time. Some people have it a hell of a lot harder than others; and I don’t mean to sound like I think otherwise.] And it improves the human world as a whole because it allows a wider variety of people to contribute to that world; including both in that it allows those who would otherwise be forbidden to to do so, and in that it frees up even those who would otherwise be allowed to because they don’t have to spend time and energy making sure they aren’t mistaken for somebody who belongs in one of the forbidden groups. > [@Velocity](#): > > It’s impossible to get people not to see race, sex, all the many things that delineate and divide us. That would be like demanding that people pretend the emperor is actually wearing clothes. Like it or not, it’s just human to see things that are there, unfortunately. We as a species cannot and will not ever stop seeing what makes us different. I don’t think we’re being asked to. The question is, what do we do about it? If I see that somebody is 6’6", and they see that I’m 5’2", are we going to each of us try to insist that everything be built to suit somebody our size? to try to insist that there’s something wrong with people of the other size, and they should be segregated, or killed, or undergo medical treatment to try to force them into the other size? to pretend that everyone just is our size, or that we ourselves are a different size than we actually are, no matter what the contrary evidence? Or are we going to commiserate a bit with each other about the fact that nearly everything seems to be built to fit somebody who’s 5’10", and start a movement to supply more places with height-adjustable chairs and to educate people of all heights about the fact that “eye level” varies? ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/16 "2023-08-19T22:38:57Z")
> [@Beckdawrek](#): > > The human condition is we want to be part of a tribe. A pack. Like minded individuals. > When you’re not you either shrink and hide or come out screaming, flailing your fists. And others desperate to part of a tribe feel the need to identify and demean those who are not as their insecure means of declaring and reassuring themselves of their own membership. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/17 "2023-08-19T23:01:51Z")
There are always gonna be bad actors. (acters?) Can’t change that. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2023, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/18 "2023-08-19T23:09:51Z")
> [@Beckdawrek](#): > > We’re all humans. I’m not. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2023, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/19 "2023-08-20T00:50:33Z")
Anybody getting into conversations like this is a human. Whatever their species. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2023, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782/20 "2023-08-20T01:07:40Z")
Eh, he’s a fish. 😊 [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/left-behind-or-otherwise/988782.md?page=2)