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clyde

Social Justice

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If everyone in the world was aware, then behavior change would come naturally I guess? For behavior-only issues, being aware that there is a problem is the biggest chunk. One would assume that the vast majority would work naturally to fix problems once they're aware there are problems. I definitely see your point for something like cancer awareness, in which you both have to be aware, and willing/able to donate. But if everyone is aware that a word is hurtful, then only those intending to be hurtful will say it, and it will become stigmatized. 

 

It's weird wording for sure.

 

Good points.  I can see how on unintentional misconduct raising awareness alone would be the end-goal for certain (like I didn't know that 'midget' was derogatory term to describe little people until early last year so knowing alone stopped me from using that).

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If everyone in the world was aware, then behavior change would come naturally I guess? 

 

Well, no. This is why the link savaging white privilege classes is so important: if everyone in the world was aware, that means those who like things just the way they are would be aware, and they will have co-opted the argument while holding onto their power as tightly as ever.

 

The problem is not the words, it's the violence they disguise. The well-known slur about black people is verboten for white people not because it's a naughty word, but it's a word white people say who are happy to kill black people they don't like. Not outing trans people is important because people will kill outed trans people.

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Well, no. This is why the link savaging white privilege classes is so important: if everyone in the world was aware, that means those who like things just the way they are would be aware, and they will have co-opted the argument while holding onto their power as tightly as ever.

 

The problem is not the words, it's the violence they disguise. The well-known slur about black people is verboten for white people not because it's a naughty word, but it's a word white people say who are happy to kill black people they don't like. Not outing trans people is important because people will kill outed trans people.

 

Could you link the specific article again if you don't mind?  I saw 3 you have linked but none of them seems to be that and that one sounds really interesting.

 

Edit: Also interesting that I'm way more, erm, 'polite' in this particular forum than elsewhere, almost to the point of wondering if I'm being disingenuous.  Just interesting to note if I'm simply tip-toeing for approval here, which is interesting because I get the feeling that most people here are white (based on few occasions when users identified their gender and race, nothing else), yet when I'm with my RL buddies (mostly dark skin hispanics and blacks from minimum wage class) all of us, including I, are not shy of all sorts of slurs that wouldn't go well online in general (which I get somewhat because there is a huge difference with same word in who speaks in what way and where)...

 

It's like I'm more cautious to not be labeled as racist by online groups than real life minority friends I hang with (reluctant to label myself as minority because most of racism I get ends up being 'positive') because I sense much more strict behavior code.  How strange and interesting!

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Could you link the specific article again if you don't mind?  I saw 3 you have linked but none of them seems to be that and that one sounds really interesting.

 

It's this one.

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Thanks, guess I skimmed too much of the stuff to realize its main content.  Re-reading through it and I think I see what you meant, like this

 

This obsessive focus on language seems, to those who have accepted its central premises, to be a trap that can catch all bad behavior within it. In fact, privileging language above all else merely empowers the more industrious to escape criticism through employing language themselves. If language is both the cage and the lock, language is inevitably the key.

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Well, no. This is why the link savaging white privilege classes is so important: if everyone in the world was aware, that means those who like things just the way they are would be aware, and they will have co-opted the argument while holding onto their power as tightly as ever.

 

The problem is not the words, it's the violence they disguise. The well-known slur about black people is verboten for white people not because it's a naughty word, but it's a word white people say who are happy to kill black people they don't like. Not outing trans people is important because people will kill outed trans people.

 

If a person like things just the way they are despite the knowledge it's wrong, it's a whole other issue in my opinion. You can't convince those people of anything directly if they are aware of the problem and refuse to change anyway. Societal pressure is the only thing that has a chance of suppressing that behavior, and that requires awareness in society in general. Also, there's a difference from knowing that I shouldn't discriminate against a minority because there are laws against it, and understanding how much it really hurts people. I'd like to think that most people, if made aware of how much pain can be caused, instead of just being told not to do it, would stop.

 

I guess it's all semantics in the end.

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If a person like things just the way they are despite the knowledge it's wrong, it's a whole other issue in my opinion. You can't convince those people of anything directly if they are aware of the problem and refuse to change anyway. Societal pressure is the only thing that has a chance of suppressing that behavior, and that requires awareness in society in general. Also, there's a difference from knowing that I shouldn't discriminate against a minority because there are laws against it, and understanding how much it really hurts people. I'd like to think that most people, if made aware of how much pain can be caused, instead of just being told not to do it, would stop.

 

I guess it's all semantics in the end.

 

The last bit is actually quite ironic since Merus' linked article is all about how all 'awareness' does is affecting semantics without actually alleviating real pain (discrimination on job application, getting arrested more, etc.) :P

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Take this with a grain of salt (namely in that Marvel/DC rebrand regularly) but the new post-Secret Wars Avengers team is looking super Social Justice-y -

 

la8vrarlyrggiz3c1bg4.jpg

 

If you're unfamiliar with Marvel comics, the team is the following -

  • Thor - female, identity unknown
  • Iron Man - potentially female "Rescue", Pepper Potts
  • Captain America - black, male, Sam Wilson, formerly Falcon
  • Ms. Marvel - Muslim, female, teenage, Kamala Khan
  • Vision - robot
  • Spiderman - black, male, teenage, Miles Morales
  • Nova - biracial, teenage, Sam Alexander

I'm incredibly stoked, I love Ms. Marvel and Thor in particular and this is sure to give them an even higher profile in terms of exposure and advertising.

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I think Miles is actually biracial, but neat.

 

Also, I didn't realizethat the new Captain America used to be Falcon. That explains why they've been pushing Falcon so hard in other media lately. I guess he'll probably replace Cap in one of the movies too.

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I guess you're right, his name is "Miles Morales" after all. I guess I forgot granted he's often referred to as an "african-american Spiderman" in a lot of media surrounding that version of the comics.

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Last year, I played Conception 2: Children of the Seven Stars, for which my one-line review was "Hetero-normative game of the year", as it's got a lot of very gendered anime trope stuff, and having children is a central mechanic of the game (you spawn them magically in a religious ceremony that is totally-not-sex).

 

But it occurred to me that I wasn't really equipped to give that designation, as I hadn't really evaluated any other games on that same basis.

 

Now I kind of want to start a site called heteronormativegamereviews.com and evaluate games entirely on the basis of their heteronormativity.

 

Maybe this belongs in the random thought thread.

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Edit: Also interesting that I'm way more, erm, 'polite' in this particular forum than elsewhere, almost to the point of wondering if I'm being disingenuous.  Just interesting to note if I'm simply tip-toeing for approval here, which is interesting because I get the feeling that most people here are white (based on few occasions when users identified their gender and race, nothing else), yet when I'm with my RL buddies (mostly dark skin hispanics and blacks from minimum wage class) all of us, including I, are not shy of all sorts of slurs that wouldn't go well online in general (which I get somewhat because there is a huge difference with same word in who speaks in what way and where)...

 

It's like I'm more cautious to not be labeled as racist by online groups than real life minority friends I hang with (reluctant to label myself as minority because most of racism I get ends up being 'positive') because I sense much more strict behavior code.  How strange and interesting!

 

 

Im sure there is a more "proper" term but i dont remember, but i think its tied to communities. Communication in certain communities is ok while it is not in others, where there are different rules or you don't belong (or belong as much). An online community is much broader potentially and anonymous than a close knit personal community of you and your friends. In your friend community the rules are much clearer in how you speak, what you say, how you say it, what words, etc. etc. 

 

Which is why they don't think you are racist even though you might use slurs because it is accepted and within that community have different meaning. If someone from outside the community uses those same slurs in the same context and with the same intended meaning, it would most likely be offensive because they are not a part of your community.

 

Kind of like certain gestures have different meaning in the US and UK. 

 

A possible reason you might feel that there is a stricter moral code online is because the rules have not been defined, or are not easily identifiable. Going through these forums to figure out what is accepted and not would take much longer than hanging out with a group of people at a bar. 

 

but yes, it is very interesting :) 

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Last year, I played Conception 2: Children of the Seven Stars, for which my one-line review was "Hetero-normative game of the year", as it's got a lot of very gendered anime trope stuff, and having children is a central mechanic of the game (you spawn them magically in a religious ceremony that is totally-not-sex).

 

But it occurred to me that I wasn't really equipped to give that designation, as I hadn't really evaluated any other games on that same basis.

 

Now I kind of want to start a site called heteronormativegamereviews.com and evaluate games entirely on the basis of their heteronormativity.

 

Maybe this belongs in the random thought thread.

 

With a hat tip to Old Man Murray, you could use 'Start to Straight' as one factor.

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This essay does a better job of arguing about some of the problems of radical politics than most. Well worth a read.

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A person with a potentially racist avatar complimented my game in a Steam forum. I'm not sure what to do about it if anything. I considered the possibility that it was an anti-racist attempt to reappropriate a cartoonish blackface, did a reverse image search and the only hits are from someone using the same avatar on white-supremacist websites.

I can't imagine that anything I say or do will change their mind. I don't like it though. I'm not sure if it matters whether or not I like it.

Maybe I can delete their comment since I started the discussion? 

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A person with a potentially racist avatar complimented my game in a Steam forum. I'm not sure what to do about it if anything. I considered the possibility that it was an anti-racist attempt to reappropriate a cartoonish blackface, did a reverse image search and the only hits are from someone using the same avatar on white-supremacist websites.

I can't imagine that anything I say or do will change their mind. I don't like it though. I'm not sure if it matters whether or not I like it.

Maybe I can delete their comment since I started the discussion? 

What about the direct approach? PM them and ask them what it is. If it's an intentionally racist joke, decide what to do next: nothing, report it... or, again, the direct approach: tell them why it's a bad joke. You're not changing their mind per se, you're just shifting the burden of considering it to them.

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What about the direct approach? PM them and ask them what it is. If it's an intentionally racist joke, decide what to do next: nothing, report it... or, again, the direct approach: tell them why it's a bad joke. You're not changing their mind per se, you're just shifting the burden of considering it to them.

 

I reported it to Steam. If I can figure out a useful approach for a PM to them I'd be willing to try, but I can't think of one. When I did the reverse search the only results were the avatar showing up on StormFront and another white-supremacy site that I had never heard of, but which was pretty suggestive of its content by its name. I don't think I'm capable of really caring what they have to say and that makes the possibility of positive interaction very unlikely. In my imagination, telling them that it's a bad joke will just get them excited about hooking an SWJ for a flame-war.

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I believe you can report that kind of thing to steam.

 

And then Steam can ignore it, like all the reviews of Depression Quest talking about how Zoe Quinn gave them a blowjob.

 

I've reported a ton of this kind of stuff and seen very little follow up. Steam seems just not to care about that they have become a very welcoming environment for racist and misogynist hate groups. 

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And then Steam can ignore it, like all the reviews of Depression Quest talking about how Zoe Quinn gave them a blowjob.

 

I've reported a ton of this kind of stuff and seen very little follow up. Steam seems just not to care about that they have become a very welcoming environment for racist and misogynist hate groups. 

 

It definitely seems to be the kind of place where Swiss-style "neutrality," meaning never taking sides with regards to anything, reigns supreme.

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It is regularly plugged in the Other Podcasts thread, but the You Are Not So Smart podcast has a very relevant latest episode. The overall podcast is about the latent biases of human psychology that drive people to act in ways we don't even recognise is happening. Each episode deals with a different bias or concept and he gives a delightful and thorough examination of it in a very readable listenable way.

 

This episode* is all about changing people's minds with something called the 'contact theory'. In the episode it uses the example of anti gay marriage people having nonconfrontational discussions with LGBTQA people, where they talk honestly and frankly but the LGBTQA person makes no conscious effort to argue their points. It's very interesting and well worth a listen.

 

 

 

* I don't know why there isn't a real blogpost at the time I'm writing this so I've linked to a weird templated version of the episode page that has the download and show notes.

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I actually talked about a watered down version of that with my grade 5s today. It was a hard conversation, but I think they benefitted from it.

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