All Fraternal organizations had their wonky traditions and costumes and secrecy and all that stuff. Like a college fraternity, or the Elks. The Masons.
That sorta thing. Secret handshakes. Funny hats. Stupid ingroup stuff. Doesn’t matter what it is. Just that only the ingroup gets it.
It’s to obscure inner workings, and activities. The language serves as a code for times and dates, titles for not using their real names.
By 1919 the Fraternal organization was a fixture in people’s lives. People had the church they belonged to as well as a lodge they belonged to. And for some, their secret society membership.
People had a lot of time to occupy before TV and the internet. That’s my takeaway.
All of the crazy titles and secret handshakes reminds me of being raised Mormon and going to the temple for the first time, back when you did the initiatory rituals mostly naked while old guys rubbed “consecrated” oil on your various body parts. Then you went to another place in the temple where they taught you the secret handshakes and passwords and you pantomimed various forms of ritual suicide. Joseph Smith was definitely inspired by Freemasonry.
The only weird title I was given was “Elder,” at the age of 19. My secret temple name was the same name as one of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - so I got that going for me, which is nice.
Actually, this makes perfect sense. First, concocting their own language was a defensive measure. That made it harder for outsiders (i.e., reporters and FBI) to infiltrate, and easier to spot if they tried. Krapsmen could talk in code and exchange messages that were meaningful to them but gibberish to anyone else. They could stand in public planning murder and nobody but other Krapsmen would realize it. Second, most Krapsmen are arrested development cases who are emotionally 12 years old, so they are attracted to the idea of living a fantasy. Hell, fantasy is their lifeblood. The very existence of the organization is based on the fantasy that an inbred ignorant alcoholic cousin-fucking unemployable Georgia cracker is better than a black man with a bachelor’s degree and a good job.
It’s not that you’re a direct oppressor, but that the society we live in was built for you and privileges you in ways that you might not see. Cops don’t see you and assume you’re a criminal. You’re co-workers don’t dismiss you because of your gender. No one questions your right to marry. No one questions your gender identity.
This doesn’t mean that you’re life isn’t hard or that you’re a bad, sexist, racist, homophobic person. It means that society was built for white men by white men, and that we still live with that legacy today.
I make the joke because I am the white guy in the discussion, so I have noticed a trind where anything happens ‘oh you don’t know’ with all the condescendingness of your typical all knowing seventeen year old. This may well be because I"m an opinionated asshole instead so grain of salt.
Still. I see a world i do not want my niece growinng up in.
Edit: It’s simply ‘fine I"m a white guy. i have not directly experienced getting pulled over on the way to and from work for a decade on the same stretch of highway and lose a court case to appeal the problem,’ or 'I’ve never been paid less based purely on gender (instead it was because family and they don’t particularly think much of me,) or any number of things. So when the rhetoric startes edging towards 'all men are pig idiots that are the tools of the establishment (not going to name names but I have seen this here as well.) I get uncomfortable because ‘hey I’m kinda trying to help here. I’m agreeing with you that the system is fucked up can you kinda not shove me in the woodchipper you’re shoving trump/mittins/that racist asshole cop/asshat banksters/etc? That’d be great thanks.’
Since, y’know, yelling at someone that wants the hatorade to slow to a trickle when newbie dude shows upand just now realizing ‘oh shit the world is fucking bullshit.’ is counterproductive and divides people that otherwise agree the world needs to change for the better.
Again. I am very loud, online at least I am VERY lud and even more opinionated. I bring some of this on myself because tempers tend to run high. Just… Yea the rhetoric leaves a bitter taste when 'uh hey I’m a guy too and happy BEING a guy… I just want the gay/black/female/transgendered/whoever to enjoy the same ‘people aren’t going to fucking hassel me until they get to personally know me’ status.
Sorry for the textwall.
So yea, the KKK… why are they still a thing? Why is racism still a thing? I get why oldsters still are racists, ditto with their groomed kids but then you get people that show up online, brows, and are active, and yet remain racist in spite of not being in Storm Front’s walled garden that might or might not exist.
Mate, from one straight white guy to another - nobody owes us anything. If we’re annoying somebody and they explain how or why we’re being annoying, they’re doing us a FAVOUR. They’re taking time out of their day to explain to some noob who is HURTING them how to get better. Don’t respond with loads of self-justifying text telling them to be nicer to allies. Why not?
This is a shitty way to repay a favour
They’ve heard it before. All of it. Like a terrible pop song that is everywhere. It’s like getting into a lift to go up 25 stories and its little tinny speaker is playing the refrain of a song you never want to hear again.
Instead, thank them for their time and apologise if you’ve done something bad.
You want the world to be better? Awesome, me too. What can we do about it?
Talk less, listen more.
Be less fragile. Just mentally add ‘not all men’ into whatever (but don’t say it aloud). If somebody is talking about something you don’t do, then they don’t mean you.
If they’re talking about something you actually do, then try not to do that thing. If you need to talk to somebody about how you do/did that thing, talk to another white guy about it.
Don’t ask women/PoC/etc to emotionally support you becoming a better ally.
Do talk to other white men who are trying to be better allies and offer mutual support.
You’re going to get things wrong sometimes. Everyone does. Just keep trying.
I understand that this makes you uncomfortable. Having to experience that discomfort is something I think white men genuinely need to go through. I don’t mean that I go out of my way to make people feel uncomfortable, because I think I don’t (sometimes I do, wow do I). Other people are a source of discomfort. More than anything else the privilege of being a white straight cis man is the privilege to not be made uncomfortable, to not be inconvenienced. The more privilege a person has, the harder it is for that person to listen openly to a person disagreeing with them without short circuiting the process with thoughts about how it makes them feel to have to listen to it. It’s a skill that needs to be practiced. It’s not about you, unless it is about you, in which case it’s up to you to do something about it.
Agreed. We should all be pushed out of our comfort zone, @singletona082, not because it’s a punishment or anything, but because it maybe makes us better people in the end. And I think that @anon50609448 is right to point out that, often, it’s not about you at all (unless it’s something you’re doing specifically). I think at the end of the day, most of us would like to live in a world where these things aren’t an issue, but it’s not going to get there unless we’re willing to, at the least, be uncomfortable sometimes.
Normally this is true. However when I, or other people that happen to fit the same ticboxes of a group that is disliked but aren’t part of said group and then get slammed with some variant of ‘YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND’ or when someone else decides to kinda go on fawning at whoever the rageaholic is and get ‘well you’re one of the GOOD ones’… I do not consider that OK. I also consider that to be fairly personal, intent or otherwise.
I guess I’m done for the moment I mean we’re a bit off topic (what is the topic? something about how stupid the KKK is?)
Based on what I’ve seen of the world in my travels it seems to be somewhat baked into the human condition. Doesnt have anything to do with young or old, online or not.
Eh… Mostly not that I’ve seen. Unfortunately I’ve seen lots more “STFU WHITE CIS-MAN OPPRESSOR” than people taking the time to actually explain. Just because someone is on the politically correct side doesnt make them qualified as an educator in many cases. However this argument is already old and the “winning side” seems to be the one you argue here
And yes it gets tiring when a bunch of people are always trying to lump you in with a mythological white devil. And sometimes there are just people who hate you for being a white guy. They are part of the problem.
But don’t make the mistake of thinking that the people doing that ‘represent’ anyone but themselves.
Everyone can be an asshole sometimes. Some certainly more than others. And some more effectively.
I found personally that asking people about their experiences that they had, that they’d like to share with me, was very valuable. Friends and forums on the internet.
I found out a lot of things I didn’t know. And kept doing that. And connected with what people were talking about.
I’m still astounded we largely have to thank Superman for taking on the KKK. IE the writers of superman post ww2 needed a new villain group and oh hey this guy did a LOT of undercover snooping into the KKK for years digging dirt up. How do we get that information in the hands of impressionable youth so they see these guys as complete scumlords before they can befully brainwashed? We can’t preach to them, that’ll just scare or bore them. This looks like a job for Superman!
