|
I do wonder why they attack privilege, when the point was to help the under privileged until they were as privileged as everyone else. Like, what the hell. Do they WANT everyone to be afraid of the cops?  I'm all for the privileges being at the same level, I just want them to go up.
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 19:23
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 20, 2024 17:12 |
|
|
The problem is that "giving everyone the same privileges" doesn't work. Many of these privileges are zero-sum. The privilege to legally own slaves, for example, is one that both white and black folk lost as a result of the abolition movement. What many leftists don't want to admit publicly is that what they want is, actually, to take things away from those who have them. And this inescapable reality, that granting certain privileges to minorities does in fact lose something for the majority who benefited is why much of the benefit comes from gaining allies who don't lose something and might even gain something as a result. Less "support our social revolution to take away your right to do blah" and more "if you help us take away the right for people like you to do blah, you'll get the ability to do foo in exchange". What I want, in regards to cops and leftists, is a strong leftist movement to get employed as cops.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 19:55
|
|
|
Effectronica posted:Montesquieu, Locke, Rousseau, Paine, Smith, Ricardo, and other liberal thinkers mainly developed liberalism through the academic modes of the time, as did Marx and Engels and Proudhon for socialism/anarchism (scientific socialism). W.E.B. du Bois, Ida B. Wells and many of the early founders of civil rights were trained academics. Even Elizabeth Stanton was trained academically, although suffragism (as opposed to the later feminists) was less academic and more practical. But even then, it was still primarily an intellectual pursuit with argumentation and the like over the rights of women. And of course the second wave of feminism was largely kicked off by The Feminine Mystique and The Second Sex. Most of the really powerful social movements have had academic and intellectual bases to work from- gay rights is about the only one where the academic basis was exogenous to the movement, but even then it still relied initially on the work of people like Hirschfeld and later Kinsey, although in a very different context from feminist writers using Friedan or Steinem. Montesquieu was a lawyer and Locke wrote his major works while his major political work while he was an acting physician (though it's true he wrote some of his other stuff while in med school). Paine was working, I think, as an Excise Officer when he first started wading into colonial politics. Rousseau was employed at various times (while he was writing) as a personal tutor and a secretary. Marx was a journalist and revolutionary, Engels was an industrialist. Ricardo was a banker and politician. That isn't to say that most of those folks didn't have the equivalent of top academic schooling for their times and they did spend a lot of time talking and thinking and refining their theories through dialogue with others, which is (or is supposed to be) a hallmark of modern academia. But I think it's dangerous to dilute our idea of what 'academic' means too much by applying it so broadly. What really stands out to me about these men and women is that they were deeply involved in the political movements of their time. They were active participants, taking part in ongoing debates with high stakes. Unless there's some kind of movement going on outside the halls of the academy I do not think we can expect academics on their own to accomplish much. I also suspect that's where some of the more toxic parts of the whole SJW movement comes from. A lot of the contempt and vitriol that you see coming from some of the more toxic parts of the SJW crowd are born of impotent fury. I think that if the left was actually scoring victories or perceived itself to be advancing then there'd be less toleration for people who can't contribute anything beyond exhortations to "check your privilege!" Fargo Fukes posted:The last few pages of this thread have been a marvellous example of how much good identity politics and privilege theory have done for the right. I mean, they've just been a gift from God for the powers-that-be. Informed by what we've read here, lets run a thought experiment: Is this based on a real event? Because if so you should just post about the actual event. I'm not really sure how plausible your example actually is and you've tailored it to specifically fit the argument you want to push. Somebody could just as easily invent their own story which proves the opposite point. As for your larger contention that "identity politics and privilege theory" are somehow handicapping the left, where is the evidence? The left lost its significant battles in the 1980s and 1990s. The problems with the left right now seem to be more of a reaction to those defeats rather than cause of them. Honestly you seem to just be doing the exact same thing as the SJW's in reverse, where you pretend that people talking about privilege on tumblr or university students getting really passionate about causes they only vaguely understand is somehow this really significant political issue rather than being fairly banal and inconsequential. Space Whale posted:I do wonder why they attack privilege, when the point was to help the under privileged until they were as privileged as everyone else. Because without an awareness of privilege it can be very easy for those privileged people to monopolize control over a group. Second wave feminism ended up mostly being about giving white middle class women the opportunity to pursue bourgeois careers while largely side lining or erasing the experiences of queer, impoverish or racialized women. There are actual material consequences to ignoring privilege in some situations. But of course a privileged person who hasn't taken any time to reflect on their own situation nor the situation of others won't necessarily recognize that.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:00
|
|
|
Helsing posted:Because without an awareness of privilege it can be very easy for those privileged people to monopolize control over a group. Second wave feminism ended up mostly being about giving white middle class women the opportunity to pursue bourgeois careers while largely side lining or erasing the experiences of queer, impoverish or racialized women. So how do you go "hey we count too" without it just being like it is now, extremely irritating? Because if you do that too much the privilege havers get annoyed and do their own thing for themselves, since they have the privilege to do so, and then the poor, queer, brown and radical people are just left there talking about privilege on tumblr.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:04
|
|
|
GlyphGryph posted:The problem is that "giving everyone the same privileges" doesn't work. Many of these privileges are zero-sum. So what do I have to lose to give black kids walk past cops and not get shot 'privileges'? Or is this about jobs? Like if a black guy had my job I'd have to take another? What exactly is to be or should be lost, an abstract sense of dominance? You're incredibly vague.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:13
|
|
|
Lightanchor posted:There's no such thing as a legitimate debate forum. excuse me i'm pretty sure that's an ad hom attack and you now lose the debt concussion accepted bitch
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:15
|
|
|
Space Whale posted:So how do you go "hey we count too" without it just being like it is now, extremely irritating? Because if you do that too much the privilege havers get annoyed and do their own thing for themselves, since they have the privilege to do so, and then the poor, queer, brown and radical people are just left there talking about privilege on tumblr. It really depends on the particular situation and context. There's no one-size-fits-all solution here. You're trying to bring this back to the internet and what is happening on tumblr. But that is the point that I'm trying to drive home to people. Any political movement mostly centred on internet bickering is going to be grating and stupid and filled with people arguing in bad faith. That is not a function of any particular theory, its just a function of how people act when they're on the net. Privilege theory was developed in the context of an actual political movement that was scoring actual victories (i.e. Women's lib). It responded to a problem that was real and serious. If you want to learn more you could check out Bell Hooks' "feminism is for everybody". I'm not sure that she actually uses the term 'privilege' but she does give some personal reflections on how Second Wave Feminism ran into difficulties because of these issues.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:15
|
|
|
Space Whale posted:So what do I have to lose to give black kids walk past cops and not get shot 'privileges'? You know it is fair to ask questions but if you have literally no knowledge of this at all then you should go educate yourself. It`s not the obligation of any poster on these forums to spoon feed information to you. And after a point it starts to look like you don`t really care about the answers and are just using this endless line of banal questioning as a way to shut down a more interesting or substantive discussion.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:17
|
|
|
Space Whale posted:So how do you go "hey we count too" without it just being like it is now, extremely irritating? Because if you do that too much the privilege havers get annoyed and do their own thing for themselves, since they have the privilege to do so, and then the poor, queer, brown and radical people are just left there talking about privilege on tumblr. At what point does trying to be intersectional consume so much bandwidth that it impedes a movement from accomplishing anything? I mean, to me it seems legit and probably more productive for a group to decide "We are going to focus on issue x and once we've done that we can see about y", as long as the group doesn't claim to represent a bunch of folks whose needs are being dismissed.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:18
|
|
|
Helsing posted:You know it is fair to ask questions but if you have literally no knowledge of this at all then you should go educate yourself. It`s not the obligation of any poster on these forums to spoon feed information to you. And after a point it starts to look like you don`t really care about the answers and are just using this endless line of banal questioning as a way to shut down a more interesting or substantive discussion. The gently caress? He's using rhetorical questioning to point out a flaw in the reasoning of the post he quoted.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:20
|
|
|
Helsing posted:Any political movement mostly centred on internet bickering is going to be grating and stupid and filled with people arguing in bad faith. That is not a function of any particular theory, its just a function of how people act when they're on the net.  Helsing posted:Privilege theory was developed in the context of an actual political movement that was scoring actual victories (i.e. Women's lib). It responded to a problem that was real and serious. If you want to learn more you could check out Bell Hooks' "feminism is for everybody". I'm not sure that she actually uses the term 'privilege' but she does give some personal reflections on how Second Wave Feminism ran into difficulties because of these issues. I guess that it's just completely poisoned to me. The concept of "don't assume everyone lives like you do, has what you have, or knows what you know" is something I sort of "got" because I had "a parent" who taught me "right from wrong." Having a morally conscious mother is in itself a privilege, I suppose. None of this was at all new to me. The radicalized version of it where someone goes "gently caress you, grovel, serve me, and get nothing back" in so many terms is, and made me have to seriously question "identity" as a good reason to do a goddamned thing, and for that matter, what mine was. I still don't know, but I know that this screaming child morality of original ism/ist essentialist poo poo isn't.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:22
|
|
|
Nevvy Z posted:The gently caress? He's using rhetorical questioning to point out a flaw in the reasoning of the post he quoted. Oh fine ruin my fun then. Helsing posted:You know it is fair to ask questions but if you have literally no knowledge of this at all then you should go educate yourself. It`s not the obligation of any poster on these forums to spoon feed information to you. And after a point it starts to look like you don`t really care about the answers and are just using this endless line of banal questioning as a way to shut down a more interesting or substantive discussion. "Read up on it, but come to my conclusions!" Yeah... no.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:24
|
|
|
wateroverfire posted:At what point does trying to be intersectional consume so much bandwidth that it impedes a movement from accomplishing anything? But then you get the constant screaming of "well we're left out or feel that way so let's blame the most privileged part of our domain" thing, such as white cis gays being hated by the rest of the LGBTQLMNOP.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:25
|
|
|
Read article, learned nothing new. There's idiots in every activist group, in every social group. The anti-science crap in leftism drives me insane, but that bent exists in people of all political leanings, it just needs to be combated. It's not a condemnation of the ideology...there was a article(Taibbi? maybe) recently of the same exact stuff I've seen on leftist groups being published in hard-right magazines. The people who seem to be most destructively dogmatic are white activists, who attempt to make themselves victims of some sort of oppression because they know they can't truly understand what it's like as they come from the oppressor class. This ends up with them being shitheads to women and PoC. People from oppressed groups tend to be way more realistic and straightforward in the way they talk about oppression. Unsurprisingly.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:29
|
|
|
Nevvy Z posted:The gently caress? He's using rhetorical questioning to point out a flaw in the reasoning of the post he quoted. But those rhetorical questions would only make sense to somebody who has spent little or no effort first trying to understand the other side of the argument. Space Whale posted:Oh fine ruin my fun then. So your argument basically boils down to "I have the right to be stupid" mixed with "wink wink, nudge nudge, I'm totally just trolling right now and it's not that I actually feel kinda threatened by these ideas."
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:30
|
|
|
No, it's clearly and explicitly WTF do people need to give up? Give an example.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:38
|
|
|
Helsing posted:So your argument basically boils down to "I have the right to be stupid" mixed with "wink wink, nudge nudge, I'm totally just trolling right now and it's not that I actually feel kinda threatened by these ideas." I think that's just everyone's position here in a rigorous formal debate forum on internet.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:39
|
|
|
Space Whale posted:So what do I have to lose to give black kids walk past cops and not get shot 'privileges'? The privilege not to care because they aren't the target is a pretty big one, and the satisfaction of seeing "thugs getting what they deserve" is another popular one. the solution here could be awareness, but not of privilege - convince they they can be and are targets as well, and then they have something to gain by supporting your cause that's probably worth more than the admittedly small privileges they've given up. This probably isn't worth thinking about in terms of privilege though - it's an ineffective framing, but building support and gaining allies, especially powerful ones, in the general public can lead to pressure. The harder problem is that the truly privileged individuals here are the cops and prosecutors, not white folk in general (black cops probably get off for killing black people too). And nothing is going to change unless you can get at least some portion of them on your side. I think the privileges the cops have (to kill people and get away with it) are obvious. So you need to offer them a benefit for losing that privilege. If you can get powerful people and members of the public to exert pressure on the departments, the benefit might be removing that pressure! Cops may value higher social standing more than they do the privilege (which they may not even use themselves) of killing black people and getting away with it. So the problem becomes convincing them that you can provide this benefit (no disruptive protests in cities with strongly accountable police forces, getting positive marks from some independent body, people throwing appreciation events instead of protesting if they're in a good city where something like this happens, if you get powerful politicians on your side maybe funding will be tied into some trackable manner of accountable departments, if you get media pundits on your side you get ignored or lauded as 'one of the good ones' while others are attacked). This might not be palatable to the left radicals who are really just seeking an opportunity to get mad in public, but it's one possible effective strategy. Abolition couldn't have been won without the support of many powerful people who had something to gain. The key is convincing them whatever privilege they are losing is worth less than being on the right side of history. But this is strategic theorizing. The privilege that will be lost is the ability to murder black kids and not face consequences others would face for doing the same. It's a privilege that police should rightfully lose. Helsing posted:You know it is fair to ask questions but if you have literally no knowledge of this at all then you should go educate yourself. It`s not the obligation of any poster on these forums to spoon feed information to you. And after a point it starts to look like you don`t really care about the answers and are just using this endless line of banal questioning as a way to shut down a more interesting or substantive discussion. I don't have a problem with his questions, even if he thinks they are rhetorical. Grounding an argument in real situations is useful, I think, and asking for real world examples is not a dumb question, especially if it clarifies what is being communicated. GlyphGryph fucked around with this message at 20:46 on Dec 5, 2014 |
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:41
|
|
|
Effectronica posted:The problem, as I see it, is that these generally involve distortions of leftist thought and there's nothing that's being done to counteract them. This can (and arguably is) leading to people developing unjust theories via these distortions. I don't see the grand public menace people are claiming exists, but I do see an internal problem for leftists. The problem with privilege theory is very simple : you can't apply population statistics directly to individuals. The whole thing is just garbage. Space Whale posted:I do wonder why they attack privilege, when the point was to help the under privileged until they were as privileged as everyone else. It makes sense once you realize a lot of online 'activists' are just assholes who found a different way to be assholes to others.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:46
|
|
|
Zeitgueist posted:Read article, learned nothing new. There's idiots in every activist group, in every social group. The author wrote about the radical left because this is the side of political spectrum she used to support. She described behaviors and ideological quirks that has driven her away from this particular group. Dismissing the article because other people also behave similarly completely misses the point. quote:The people who seem to be most destructively dogmatic are white activists, who attempt to make themselves victims of some sort of oppression because they know they can't truly understand what it's like as they come from the oppressor class. This ends up with them being shitheads to women and PoC. Citation needed. If this forum is representative, this isn't always the case.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:48
|
|
|
The last few posts reminded me of this.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:48
|
|
|
Helsing posted:But those rhetorical questions would only make sense to somebody who has spent little or no effort first trying to understand the other side of the argument. Helsing posted:So your argument basically boils down to "I have the right to be stupid" mixed with "wink wink, nudge nudge, I'm totally just trolling right now and it's not that I actually feel kinda threatened by these ideas." You protest too much about trolling, I think.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:50
|
|
|
Gantolandon posted:The author wrote about the radical left because this is the side of political spectrum she used to support. She described behaviors and ideological quirks that has driven her away from this particular group. Dismissing the article because other people also behave similarly completely misses the point. I understand that's her background, nor did I dismiss the article. I said it wasn't really shocking unless you're looking for a reason to feel superior to leftists. We had a bunch of career "any opportunity to jab at leftists" posters within the first page. It's not necessarily talking about you. quote:Citation needed. If this forum is representative, this isn't always the case. Citation: My personal experience, and I'm a white guy. Do with that what you will.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 20:55
|
|
|
You're saying white males tend to be way less "realistic and straightforward when they talk about oppression" and you're using the fact that you're white and male and you're not "realistic and straightforward" as evidence?
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:02
|
|
|
Lightanchor posted:You're saying white males tend to be way less "realistic and straightforward when they talk about oppression" and you're using the fact that you're white and male and you're not "realistic and straightforward" as evidence? you cracked the code
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:08
|
|
|
I wonder how different poor vs affluent, college vs blue collar, etc, persons break down wrt their perceptions of this subject.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:11
|
|
tsa posted:The problem with privilege theory is very simple : you can't apply population statistics directly to individuals. The whole thing is just garbage. I have never, ever, seen anybody talk about privilege theory who wasn't denouncing it. It does not exist.
|
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:12
|
|
|
Zeitgueist posted:Read article, learned nothing new. There's idiots in every activist group, in every social group.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:17
|
|
|
Effectronica posted:I have never, ever, seen anybody talk about privilege theory who wasn't denouncing it. It does not exist. This is a dangerous argument, because you could say the same thing about misogyny or racism. I agree that the impact of 'privilege theory' or whatever is being massively overblown but I think on some level everybody in this thread understands what is being referred to is a complex of ideas and behaviours that actually do exist, at least to some degree. The actual debate is how noteworthy all of this is and whether its actually unique to the left.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:24
|
|
Helsing posted:This is a dangerous argument, because you could say the same thing about patriarchy. You can find descriptions of what patriarchy entails, whereas nobody ever bothers to explain what privilege theory is that isn't just privilege. It's also ridiculous to treat the complex of behaviors in question as a theory, IMO. And I don't think that the second part of the debate is really relevant, except in the tired left-vs-right slapfight where people end up having to smack themselves for lack of opponents.
|
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:26
|
|
|
Patriarchy is also seemingly not nearly as often thrown at individual people, except by the CYP crew, for that matter.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:32
|
|
|
Zeitgueist posted:The people who seem to be most destructively dogmatic are white activists, who attempt to make themselves victims of some sort of oppression because they know they can't truly understand what it's like as they come from the oppressor class. This ends up with them being shitheads to women and PoC.  Fargo Fukes posted:The last few pages of this thread have been a marvellous example of how much good identity politics and privilege theory have done for the right. I mean, they've just been a gift from God for the powers-that-be. Informed by what we've read here, lets run a thought experiment: Sounds like Occupy!
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:41
|
|
|
Well whether or not it should be elevated to the status of "theory" I think there's a sense that on some parts of the campus left we've reached a point where talking about privilege has become more of a form of social signalling or status building than an actual tool for dismantling oppression. I've certainly met people who seem to be using it that way (usually they are white dudes, no less). I had a discussion with an anarchist once who said that the first thing he thinks about whenever he talks to anyone is all the reasons that their privilege caused them to say that. And he explicitly used the world 'privilege'. I asked him what room his framework had for the idea of solidarity and after a bit of debate he basically said it was impossible for solidarity to ever happen. Then he claimed that every actually existing leftist movement ever was a failure that only advanced the privilege of white people. I asked him about how he would apply his ideas to a real world setting (if someone is worried that a wage increase will lead to price inflation that eats up the increased purchasing power then how do you use your ideology to address that question? How do you determine if it is or isn't a valid concern?) and he said he had no interest in empirical reality. Also, ironically enough, this guy could literally not shut up and would talk over his poor girlfriend who rarely ever got a word in edgewise. He was a walking embodiment of many of the stereotypes he thought he was fighting against and his constant refrain about how everyone else should check their privilege was basically just a technique for allowing him to dominate any conversation. So people like this do actually exist outside the fevered imagination of right wing internet trolls and I think its useful for the left to pause for a moment and think about where these people are coming from. If they waste resources or push away well intentioned people from getting involved in progressive causes then that's a problem and I don't think we should just ignore it because of a circle-the-wagons mentality.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:42
|
|
|
i think youre mising the fact that people have sex i dont like
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:44
|
|
|
Blue Star posted:Sounds like another "political correctness gone mad" opinion piece. I don't buy it. Oppressed people do not have to take the feelings of oppressors into account, nor should they. Most men are misogynist. White people are racist. Sorry if that hurts somebody's feelings. Someone should put you out of your misery
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:47
|
|
|
Space Whale posted:I wonder how different poor vs affluent, college vs blue collar, etc, persons break down wrt their perceptions of this subject. So do you actually care about my response to your questions about which privileges would be lost and why we should care in response to your request for specific details?
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:48
|
|
|
Ernie Muppari posted:i think youre mising the fact that people have sex i dont like I tried to make a thread about that but it wasn't wordy enough for Helsing to give a proper nod before talking about the actual topic, that is, politicization of other people's sex lives. Wanna post there?
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:48
|
|
|
GlyphGryph posted:So do you actually care about my response to your questions about which privileges would be lost and why we should care? Well, yes, since then "privileges are just gonna be lost it's zero sum you're gonna lose" is more than just rhetoric, it's actually a thing worth discussing and thinking about. Edit: It's so loving vague and so apparently smugfuel for the people who throw it around and call everyone who isn't kowtowing or brown/vaghaving/queer/whatever "scared" of it that I really question what the point is besides a verbal bludgeon. Every loving act a human with agency can take is apparently a privilege to these people, such as the privilege to take a walk, or pee standing up, or breathe through my nose. So when I ask "OK, so what am I going to actually 'lose'?" and the answer is "the privilege to not care, or the privilege a cop has to not kill someone," I wonder if they're just having clumsiness from being really far up their rear end with their vocabulary. I'm trying to figure out if it's vague so that it's what they want it to be to use it as a bludgeon, or if it's just because it's kids on the internet. Space Whale fucked around with this message at 21:55 on Dec 5, 2014 |
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 21:49
|
|
|
Space Whale posted:Awareness of the problem or awareness of I should verbally self flagellate when in the company of browns and vag-havers or queers who lean too far left? No, don't worry about it *marks other doors with lamb's blood, leaves your door unmarked*
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 22:03
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 20, 2024 17:12 |
|
|
SedanChair posted:No, don't worry about it *marks other doors with lamb's blood, leaves your door unmarked* What's the color of the sky in your fantasy world?
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2014 22:05
|
|