Nothing to do with anything.

[LMNO]

I think it's far more useful to explain your viewpoint in an effective way than to say, "you can't see what I'm talking about because of smarglefliggit" (the word I'm using in place of privilege).

What caught my attention and made me fully realize my smarglefliggit wasn't being told I have it.  Hell, I knew I had it.  You'd have to be kind of dense not to see it.  But what tipped the scales were appeals to compassion, in the most literal sense, "suffer with".  I was able to, briefly*, understand what it felt like to suffer through patriarchal oppression, and that glimpse brought into bold relief some kinds of the smarglefliggit that I hadn't really seen before.  Like it says in the Chao Te Ching, "Reading about laughter is not the same as laughing"... only reversing the emotions.

This is probably why I'm a bit skeptical about the "you can't know what it's like" gambit.  I agree, of course I do, because I don't experience it.  But in my personal instance, I gained understanding through empathy, not rationality.










*Very, very briefly and most likely incompletely, as well.

[Juana]

I tend to think that being able to tell people when to check their privilege (so long as evidence OF privilege, or whatever term you wish to use, is provided) is valuable.

If you can do it in a way that doesn't say SHUT UP and/or GET BACK IN YOUR BOX.

I know you and Nigel didn't mean that (I think SP did), but delivery is everything.

Oh hey, I have some time before class. I'll come back and finish that first thought after class, though, since that will require more thought than the below.

There are going to be people who are going to interpret it that way, no matter what. Even the most gently phrased, "hey, the situation you were born (insert privileged group here) into makes it harder to see how the system that gives you that privilege affects people who do not have the same privileges you do. Here's how and why" is going to come off to, potentially a lot of people, as SHUT UP AND GET IN YOUR BOX.
This is especially true when the privilege comes from how society boxes you (because it does and there's only so much you can do about it).

I think it's far more useful to explain your viewpoint in an effective way than to say, "you can't see what I'm talking about because of smarglefliggit" (the word I'm using in place of privilege).

What caught my attention and made me fully realize my smarglefliggit wasn't being told I have it.  Hell, I knew I had it.  You'd have to be kind of dense not to see it.  But what tipped the scales were appeals to compassion, in the most literal sense, "suffer with".  I was able to, briefly*, understand what it felt like to suffer through patriarchal oppression, and that glimpse brought into bold relief some kinds of the smarglefliggit that I hadn't really seen before.  Like it says in the Chao Te Ching, "Reading about laughter is not the same as laughing"... only reversing the emotions.

This is probably why I'm a bit skeptical about the "you can't know what it's like" gambit.  I agree, of course I do, because I don't experience it.  But in my personal instance, I gained understanding through empathy, not rationality.

*Very, very briefly and most likely incompletely, as well.

That is the most awkward replacement ever. The appeal to compassion as a way to understand is exactly what Nigel, SP, myself, and a couple others, have been saying for threads.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

That is the most awkward replacement ever. The appeal to compassion as a way to understand is exactly what Nigel, SP, myself, and a couple others, have been saying for threads.

That is most emphatically NOT what SP said.  I was there.

[Freeky]

Yeah, Signora was more about appeal to authority and ridicule.

[trippinprincezz13]

I think I'd like to take a stab at that.

Your friends are important.  Your beliefs are important.  They are, however, important in entirely separate catagories.

Or they should be.  Now your beliefs are more important than your friends, through an artificial blending of the catagories.  This is one definition of fanaticism.

And if that's the price of admission, I'm not interested.  I can be a feminist on my own, without anyone else's rule sets.  If that means that I somehow "bring out your inner RHWN" like it does with P3nt, then that's a problem in YOUR head, not mine.

This.

Since there is no word that fits in "Discordia:Discordianism::___________:Feminism" I will make one up.

Feminasm: Something that happens or exists, that furthers the goals of gender equality. Something accomplished. Something concrete that diminishes the social power of patriarchy.

Feminism: An unwieldy, cumbersome tower of suppositions, assumptions and beliefs that empowers a person to decide whether or not someone or something is sufficiently Feminist, and actually has very little to do with accomplishing anything.

From another angle: I am not interested in being part of a club, but I am interested in living in a world where gender equality is the norm and not the exception. I don't want to be programmed with a scripted set of required behaviors and beliefs ("Feminism") and join a collective to achieve that, though; I want to be given the latitude to realize and learn and come to my own conclusions, and make my own contributions to the cause without being told I am not doing it correctly ("Feminasm").

And this. I am often hesitant to too strongly associate myself strongly with any sort of group/cause/ism because I often get the signal that it's All or Nothing, Us. v. Them, With Us or Against Us, Our Way or the Highway. I might agree 95% with a particular group, but if I don't give that blind 100%, if there's a slight difference in ideology, opinion or method, it seems to eliminate any common ground reached or already there prior to that point.

Not to make light or over-simplify but - I might join the Justin Beiber Fan Club because I think his soulful music is a voice for our generation and would like to connect with like-minded people. But I also think that Yanni really knows how to get the party started and mention at our next Club meeting that Yanni is also a musician and has some songs that are as rockin' or even rockin'-er than Justin's, suddenly I am disgrace to all that is Saint Beiber and I should just tear up my membership card now and go kick puppies, or whatever it is you Yanni-lovers do.

I post something critical of Obama - I must be some Jesus lovin' redneck being Republican (maybe even a racist!). If I post something critical about Republicans - why don't you just go marry Tzar Obama if you love him so much. Say something about women's rights - you must hate men! If I comment on how delicious this cow is, well then I must just love to torture animals before they go to the slaughterhouse for that extra-inhumane flavor. It's all just icky to me.

I try to judge everyone on an individual basis, how they treat me and how I observe them treat those around them. There may be differences of opinion, even heated discussions or arguments, but unless someone holds a particularly vile opinion that they are completely unwilling to reconsider or examine, it usually will not affect my opinion of them as a friend or person. I chalk it up to a case of misunderstanding, misinformation, unawareness or sometimes, simply just a difference in opinion. Maybe we'll have this discussion again, maybe we won't, but if all signs point to the fact that they are a good or decent person, with good intentions (wherever those may pave the road too) I can't just write them off, just because they don't know and hold dear all the same things that I do.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

And this. I am often hesitant to too strongly associate myself strongly with any sort of group/cause/ism because I often get the signal that it's All or Nothing, Us. v. Them, With Us or Against Us, Our Way or the Highway. I might agree 95% with a particular group, but if I don't give that blind 100%, if there's a slight difference in ideology, opinion or method, it seems to eliminate any common ground reached or already there prior to that point.

And that's the tragedy here, isn't it?

[LMNO]

The appeal to compassion as a way to understand is exactly what Nigel, SP, myself, and a couple others, have been saying for threads.

If that's really the case, then the level of effective communication has been in negative numbers.  The message that I heard could be paraphrased as, "You will never know what it's like, and you cannot use parallel experiences as a sympathetic (as in, "having similar feelings") understanding."

[The Good Reverend Roger]

The appeal to compassion as a way to understand is exactly what Nigel, SP, myself, and a couple others, have been saying for threads.

If that's really the case, then the level of effective communication has been in negative numbers.  The message that I heard could be paraphrased as, "You will never know what it's like, and you cannot use parallel experiences as a sympathetic (as in, "having similar feelings") understanding."

This is what I said earlier.  The message being SENT is apparently not the message being RECEIVED.

[LMNO]

Yeah.  I can really see that now.

[Juana]

The appeal to compassion as a way to understand is exactly what Nigel, SP, myself, and a couple others, have been saying for threads.

If that's really the case, then the level of effective communication has been in negative numbers.  The message that I heard could be paraphrased as, "You will never know what it's like, and you cannot use parallel experiences as a sympathetic (as in, "having similar feelings") understanding."

That is absolutely not what I said and I'm a little befuddled as to how that happened, because I said the opposite, almost verbatim, repeatedly.

That is the most awkward replacement ever. The appeal to compassion as a way to understand is exactly what Nigel, SP, myself, and a couple others, have been saying for threads.

That is most emphatically NOT what SP said.  I was there.

So was I. Hmm. I'll go investigate this.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

That is the most awkward replacement ever. The appeal to compassion as a way to understand is exactly what Nigel, SP, myself, and a couple others, have been saying for threads.

That is most emphatically NOT what SP said.  I was there.

http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php/topic,32979.450.html

Starting with reply 460.

It's amazing that the thread went directly to shit from that point, isn't it?

[Juana]

*wince* Okay, it did fall apart pretty fast after that.

The appeal to compassion as a way to understand is exactly what Nigel, SP, myself, and a couple others, have been saying for threads.

If that's really the case, then the level of effective communication has been in negative numbers.  The message that I heard could be paraphrased as, "You will never know what it's like, and you cannot use parallel experiences as a sympathetic (as in, "having similar feelings") understanding."

That is absolutely not what I said and I'm a little befuddled as to how that happened, because I said the opposite, almost verbatim, repeatedly.

(addressed to Vex, for context)

You are not getting what Nige is saying. Like, at all. Sympathy and empathy, you can (and should) have. You may certainly have parallel experiences that make it much, much easier to understand what it's like but the actual, physical living it is not something you can actually do (short of doing something like Black Like Me).
You have one(?) kid, correct? You certainly don't seem like the kind of guy who would bail on his pregnant lady, so you were there for it, yes? Would you say you get what it's actually like to be pregnant (the kid sitting on your bladder, your hormones freaking out, etc.) or would you say you can sympathize what it's like because you were there and observed how uncomfortable actually being pregnant is because you were there for your wife through hers?

[Freeky]

The appeal to compassion as a way to understand is exactly what Nigel, SP, myself, and a couple others, have been saying for threads.

If that's really the case, then the level of effective communication has been in negative numbers.  The message that I heard could be paraphrased as, "You will never know what it's like, and you cannot use parallel experiences as a sympathetic (as in, "having similar feelings") understanding."

That is absolutely not what I said and I'm a little befuddled as to how that happened, because I said the opposite, almost verbatim, repeatedly.

Nigel was the one who said that, in those words.

[Juana]

Can you find that quote? Because that doesn't sound like what I remember her saying.

I think that's the problem. Telling me which specific beliefs and behaviors I need to have is counterproductive even if you're right about them. It isn't that I disagree with what you'd have me do, it's that it's important to me that I arrive at that point and do those things without you needing to tell me to.

Understandable, although I tend to think that being able to tell people when to check their privilege (so long as evidence OF privilege, or whatever term you wish to use, is provided) is valuable. It's, "hey, your position in society makes it harder to see what x group sees. Here's why." Do you disagree?

That doesn't mean we can't have the discussion, because if nobody brings these things up, nobody's going to learn about them or act on them, but it's not going to help if every time my ideas don't reach as far as yours, or my actions don't measure up in some way with what you would like to see, I am met with "OMGPRIVILEGESEXISM."

Not faulting you for the fact that your ideas don't reach as far as mine. I've done a fair bit of reading on the subject and I get the idea that you haven't. That's how it is, and I'd be fucking stupid to expect you understand the nuance if you don't have the background.
I don't recall hollering that at you recently (key word: recall). In fact, I think we've been mostly in agreement recently.

There has to be a recognition for every hand pushing this wreck off the highway, no matter how slight the pressure, as long as it isn't trying to pull the wrong way.

I'm confused. What do you mean by this?

[Freeky]

Can you find that quote? Because that doesn't sound like what I remember her saying.

I think that's the problem. Telling me which specific beliefs and behaviors I need to have is counterproductive even if you're right about them. It isn't that I disagree with what you'd have me do, it's that it's important to me that I arrive at that point and do those things without you needing to tell me to.

I'm on my phone ATM and it's a pain just keeping current, let alone digging.

I remember it was Nigel because I was so weirded out by it, but I didn't feel like getting into semantics with her over "empathy" and "sympathy" and why isn't it possible.
Understandable, although I tend to think that being able to tell people when to check their privilege (so long as evidence OF privilege, or whatever term you wish to use, is provided) is valuable. It's, "hey, your position in society makes it harder to see what x group sees. Here's why." Do you disagree?

That doesn't mean we can't have the discussion, because if nobody brings these things up, nobody's going to learn about them or act on them, but it's not going to help if every time my ideas don't reach as far as yours, or my actions don't measure up in some way with what you would like to see, I am met with "OMGPRIVILEGESEXISM."

Not faulting you for the fact that your ideas don't reach as far as mine. I've done a fair bit of reading on the subject and I get the idea that you haven't. That's how it is, and I'd be fucking stupid to expect you understand the nuance if you don't have the background.
I don't recall hollering that at you recently (key word: recall). In fact, I think we've been mostly in agreement recently.

There has to be a recognition for every hand pushing this wreck off the highway, no matter how slight the pressure, as long as it isn't trying to pull the wrong way.

I'm confused. What do you mean by this?