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It’s not whataboutism for me, a trans person who posts on Somethingawful, who was directly affected by the incident this article is talking about, to gently remind you that actually there are in fact groups other than “white men” who make the internet hell for some minorities. Who make it hell for me, in fact.
It’s telling, that you said “white men”. Not “cishet white men”, despite the fact that the vast majority of the internet asshole brigade are, in fact, cisgender and heterosexual. But you didn’t think those traits bore mentioning. For some reason.
And it’s interesting, isn’t it, how as soon as a member of a marginalised group you aren’t part of points out the oppression enacted by a group you are part of – points out the fact that some of the oppression this article is about was enacted by a group you are part of – you try and brush it away by calling it whataboutism.
Sound familiar?
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Do you think that would help? And that’s a serious question. I mean, I can see where it would be nice to have all your regulars have your back, I wouldn’t think these people could be shamed. Instead of having real comments mixed in with the vile and threatening, you’d just have trollies insulting you and the men who call them out [quote=“Espresso, post:34, topic:158536”]
all fucking day and night [/quote]
But it sounds like everyone else is calling out the trollies and the white male cisgender heterosexual commentators are not, that’s pretty poor.
So far the best way for me to understand privilege as people call it now is to realize I’m stuck in a very specific corner of the world and the rules and parameters I’m working within are a lot different compared to what others are working with… to put it another way, there are a lot of things which will always be more abstract and distant for me, and that fundamentally impacts my perception of reality
I once witnessed a trans person nearly getting kicked out of a community that was largely geeky white men on account of some tosser digging up a photo of them with some nazi paraphernalia and someone apparently didn’t like their facial expression and decided it was too approving. Would not suprise me one bit if the big stink was generated by a white guy trolling, but I also have seen people lose their shit who weren’t white men (black guy on transit ranting at length about Indians). There is a lot of stuff I don’t encounter, though. Because I experienced these things directly I continue to assume they are possible, even if unlikely
Oh hai. I’m a transwoman too and you’re trying to twist my point into something else.
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I’m not trying to “twist your point” into anything. And I apologise for assuming you were cis.
But whatever point you’re trying to make, you’re trying to make it on an article that was about something which affected me personally, in a way which implicitly exculpates some of the people responsible for those events.
It baffles me that you can’t seem to imagine just how unpleasant that feels.
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It’s part a broader solution, I think. The recent rise of nazis is (IMHO) due to the fact that their behavior is being normalized. People express vile things when they feel it’s going to be safe to do so. Having a 4chan troll for president is certainly not helping. Of course forum moderation, deplatforming, and other tools all help. I don’t claim to have all the answers, I just get weary of watching good people sitting idly by eating popcorn because they can.
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I am sorry for the pain that you are in. I’m sorry that my post made that pain worse. We’re clearly on the same side of these issues, so let’s leave it at that.
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I think the trick is for every website, forum, whatever, to recognise that they are hosted. That the hosts must take responsibility for behaviour amongst their guests, their clientele. And for each visitor to know just what behaviour is expected. That even the worst spaces in meatspace have limits which will get you tossed on your ear. And that unlike meatspace, you can’t tell the dives from the plazas.
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When Star Wars first came out, people seemed far more interested in cosplaying Luke, Han, and Leia than Vader or stormtroopers. But nowadays the empire gets a lot more love than the good guys.
…Just as the country is getting more fashist every day. It bothers me that one if my favorite things is making things worse.
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