Oh my fucking god. I cannot stand the far left

The BBQ Pit
281

It is? Golly. And here I’ve always thought the Pit was basically a sort of rhetorical mud-wrestling arena, a consensual playground for people who enjoy fulmination and invective for their own sakes, as Sylvanz notes.

I’ve certainly never felt actual emotional distress or “shame and suffering” from people verbally attacking me in the Pit, and I have no interest in causing or witnessing “shame and suffering” in other people. I think that if some people find Pit-style verbal abuse genuinely wounding or traumatic—which is totally okay; not everybody has to enjoy mud-wrestling, either—then they are probably better advised not to participate in Pit threads. It’s not really reasonable to expect other Dopers to be mind-readers about which posters consider Pit-style aggressive argument as recreational forensic competition, and which perceive it as gratuitous cruelty.

But, since here we are and you’re still (presumably voluntarily) arguing:

Yes, I know. I never said that you did say “every”.

My point, as I think I made pretty clear in this post, is that focusing on the bad behavior of “toxic subcultures” within minority groups is very often something of a self-soothing buck-passing exercise (whether consciously or not) in majority culture. Like this:

That insistence on the culpability of those subgroups specifically for “driv[ing] back progress” and “giv[ing] that group a bad name” is the kind of distorted focus I’m talking about. It’s not simply calling out toxic destructive behavior for being toxic and destructive, which would be perfectly reasonable. Rather, it’s trying to foreground that toxic destructive behavior as a driver of bigotry against the group as a whole.

The ultimate function of that kind of argument is not to support an oppressed minority group, but to reassure the majority that “hey, the problem to focus on here is not persistent systemic bigotry in mainstream culture, but the behavior of this genuinely toxic subset who are reinforcing bigoted perceptions!”

And I don’t think that’s good. For one thing, that type of buck-passing exercise often further distorts reality by exaggerating, or sometimes outright inventing, alleged toxic subcultures that don’t really exist, or don’t have anywhere near the influence that is being claimed for them.

That’s what I was illustrating in this post on research about the “acting white” trope. To wit, mainstream white-majority culture is very enamored of the notion that there are substantial numbers of “toxic subculture” black Americans “rejecting education and literacy as being ‘too white’”, but most of that notion is a myth.

And if these arguments seem to you like “abuse”, well, like I said, I don’t think it’s my lack of “nuance” that’s the problem here.

282

Any thorough explanation of what the Pit is must also acknowledge the food and book discussions.

I don’t know why, but so many threads devolve into discussions about food and books.

Maybe it’s just that’s what happens when too many nerds get together and the gloves come off.

283

This is far too well-considered of a response for the pit. Shame on you.

But also well said.

284

Contention makes me hungry. And books, well, that is probably some association to a couple of large guys in diapers shouting poetry at each other.

285

At this point discussion with you is pointless. You are lying on multiple levels to find violations of social mores which you can use to attack people.

If you actually spoke to people, you’d actually meet people who were upset about toxic subcultures. But either you haven’t met them, or you are lying to pretend they don’t exist.

I can’t debate with a pathological liar with no integrity.

Good luck to anyone who sadly has to put up with you in the real world.

286

Welcome to the club, @Kimstu. At least he didn’t talk about your spouse.

287

Eh, well, that’s @Kimstu for you.

288

So if someone disagrees with you, with cites, your answer is that they are pathological liars with no integrity instead of finding your own citation? I don’t try to diagnose people, because as I’ve noted I am not any sort of a mental health professional, but this is odd.

289

? Are you not reading my posts? I acknowledged way back in this post, which I just linked to again in my most recent post that you just replied to, that there are people who are upset about toxic subcultures.

I mean, if you can’t infer from that (and from everything else I’ve posted) that I recognize that toxic subcultures exist and that a lot of people are justifiably concerned about them, I don’t think there’s any possible way to explain it to you more clearly.

My point is that we can both acknowledge the reality of toxic subcultures and critique the ways that “toxic subculture” rhetoric is often used as a form of self-soothing blame deflection in mainstream culture.

This is classic white fragility cranked up to 11.5. You encountered a reasoned argument about some of the problems with “toxic subculture” rhetoric, and the ways it’s frequently used in mainstream culture to deflect discomfort about systemic bigotry. And what you (incorrectly) perceived is a dishonest attempt to deny the very existence of toxic subcultures, for the purpose of accusing you personally of being a racist.

Fortunately, most people who have to put up with me in the real world (as well as on these boards) seem to be more capable of handling nuance, and of having their assumptions challenged without taking it as a gratuitously malevolent attack on them personally. Still, I appreciate your good wishes on their behalf.

290

I see what you did there. :wink:

291

Are you accusing @Wesley_Clark of using the “toxic subculture” rhetoric to deflect blame from mainstream culture? Or are you just pointing that out as a general knowledge point of information spun off from what he said? I genuinely can’t tell which is your intention.

292

Well, that’s par for the course with you and me. I have accepted that you and I just seem to be permanently tuned to different communication wavelengths, even when it seems to me that most other posters don’t have difficulty understanding me. As I’ve acknowledged elsewhere, that’s probably ultimately some kind of deep-wired clarity glitch on my part, but I’ve given up trying to diagnose it because attempting explanations generally seems to just increase the confusion.

I don’t expect that this explanation attempt will be any different, but here goes: I haven’t seen any evidence that Wesley_Clark consciously endorses any racist or bigoted positions. And I am not enough of a mind-reader or psychologist to be able to tell how Wesley_Clark personally feels in terms of explicit discomfort about engaging with issues of systemic racism, implicit bias, etc. So I’m not accusing him of deliberately or knowingly trying to deflect blame from systemic majority-culture racism in any way, no.

But I think the high-intensity defensiveness, resentment, suspicion of personal attack, etc. shown in his posts on these issues in this thread come across as very typical white-fragility behavior. And, consciously or not, strategies of blame deflection are part of the white-fragility toolkit for soothing majority-culture discomfort around racial issues.

293

Cool. For future reference, when you respond to posts like Der Trihs’ or Wesley Clark’s the way you have, the implication is that you are correcting them. You could avoid giving that impression, if you cared to, pretty easily.

For example, if Der Trihs lists examples of shitty Far Left beliefs, and you wanted to point out that right wingers often incorrectly ascribe those beliefs to progressives, you could say something like “it sure does suck how right wingers often ascribe these beliefs to Progressives” rather than simply replying to Der Trihs with “none of those are progressive positions though”.

I think it’s pretty clear that I’m not the only one who interpreted your posts in this way, but whatever.

294

I, for one, did not interpret kimstu’s posts that way. I thought he was quite clear. I thought Wesley Clark’s reaction was way over board, and just odd. I also find your instructions to Kimstu on how to post to others as odd. I think he’s quite nice and his posts are very concise and understandable. YM obviously MV

295

Neither did I, and the response seemed disproportionate.

296

Thirded. Great post by @Kimstu; very reasonably made some nuanced points, and the unhinged response, calling him/her a “pathological liar” (when the only example given of a supposed lie was the exact opposite of what Kimstu had said) was just bizarre.

297

Now, keep in mind, I’m not here to defend Clark’s response to Kimstu. That’s not my point; yeah, calling her a pathological liar or whatever is over the top.

What I object to is Kimstu pretending that this came out of nowhere, or out of Clark’s “white fragility”, rather than coming as a response to the way that her own posts are aggressive and lecturing in tone.

Which, by the way, isn’t really a criticism. It’s fine to be aggressive and to lecture people at times. But let’s not pretend that this isn’t what we are doing. When Der Trihs listed annoying things that far left people do and Kimstu’s response was “Well none of those are things progressives do”, the implication that Der Trihs actually made the claim that progressives do these things, is implied (unless you take half a sentence to say “I realize you aren’t saying this, but dishonest actors like Octoputz are”). Getting all huffy and puffy and accusing anyone who points this out of white fragility is silly.

And if you think that Clark brought up “toxic subculture” for nefarious reasons, you absolutely SHOULD call him out for that and give him a little lecture about white fragility. But it’s pretty dishonest to give that lecture, act surprised when Clark is offended, and then pretend that you did not make that implication and how could anyone have read into it otherwise?

298

Disagree. Kimstu’s posts have been very reasonable, and the disproportionate responses makes me question how Wesley’s interactions with the “far left” actually went down.

But octopus had made the claim that those were views held by “media, academia, and city and state governments” so I think it’s absolutely right to clarify that, to the extent those beliefs exist (and I’ll say again I think Der Trihs is talking absolute horseshit), it’s so far from the mainstream that no-one can even find a cite.
So yes, explicitly saying why the clarification was necessary might have been helpful; but I don’t think it was aggressive in tone.

299

I’m pretty sure it comes out of WC projecting like a mf.

300

Holy shit, seriously? What are you gaining from pretending that crazy leftists don’t exist?

No one is saying that these people are influential or in positions of power (Octoputz aside). Everyone, WC included, has gone on at length about how the Left marginalizes these voices while the Right embraces their equivalent.

Again, the Far Left under discussion is not progressives, so - given the fact that from your posts I gather you’re Progressive and not a Tankie - I’m not sure why you feel the need to run interference for them.

You doubt they exist - have you been on Twitter?

Here’s Norman Finkelstein, one of the top “scholars” quoted by Pro Palestinian activists, proudly explaining why he believes Russia had the right to invade Ukraine:

And here’s a transcript of another appearance he did where he explains how it would be a dishonor to the memory of his Eastern European parents if he did not support Russia’s right to invade Ukraine:

And this is a very influential figure among the Far Left and nowadays creeping into Progressive circles (somehow, the fact that he brags about being a Maoist would disqualify him from being taken seriously IMHO, but what a world we live in…). Random people that @Der_Trihs debated online are undoubtedly even crazier.

But sure, Pro Russia leftists don’t exist :roll_eyes: