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The ability to leverage performative victimhood invalidates any claim that you are weak. If you are actually weak, you will do anything not to draw attention t

by lhnz 9y ago

The ability to leverage performative victimhood invalidates any claim that you are weak. If you are actually weak, you will do anything not to draw attention to your self, as you will not be able to control the perceptions or actions of others.

timthelion 9y ago
I guess the key phrase there is "leverage". Does your performace succeed? In the case of trans people on US coasts, this seems to be changing. For a short time, their identity had leverage, but the fact that this discussion is criticizing the authors of the letter for trying to leverage trans victim-hood, suggests that this leverage is waning. As an example of a group without victim-hood leverage, see NAMBLA [1], which represents another sexual orientation, but one which bears no leverage. Another victimized group with seemingly no leverage are those victims of child abuse who are suffering from multiple personality disorder. I know, in the abstract one would say that a victim of child abuse certainly has leverage, but if you read the appeals by those who suffer from severe psychological disorders as a result, you will immediately feel yourself recoil in disgust and grant them no audience. People tend to not see "monsters" as victims, and if we find people too weird or frightening we don't see them as victims. What other groups have no leverage? Perhaps some drug users, we tend to blame them for their problems. I would argue, that leverage is sometimes directly related to power. For example, the Jews were rich before WWII, and are still rich today. Since the holocaust, their victim-hood has born unparalleled leverage. However, in the same holocaust, the Roma people of the Czech Republic were treated just as badly as the Jews, and being poor, far fewer of them escaped. Yet the Roma have almost no leverage from their holocaust victim-hood. But do you think that trans people have power? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Man/Boy_Love_Association https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Man/Boy_Love_As...
- lhnz 9y ago
  > But do you think that trans people have power? In this particular case this identity is instrumentalised in order to modify the behaviour of Patreon. This simply wouldn't be done so readily unless the identity within this context carried power. I do not think that trans people in general have power. However, a lack of power in one context, can sometimes be an arbitrage opportunity in contexts where an oppressed identity is currency. I'm not against this but the underlying power dynamics are too interesting to be ignored. That said, I dislike the usage of the phrase "literally scared for their lives". This phrase is meant to be used to call on others to defend lives and here it is being used to call on other's to defend an ability to make money selling porn. Crying wolf undermines the ability for truly endangered people to ask for help. It is ethically repulsive to me that people that consider themselves good dilute the meaning of cries for help for base political expediency. By doing this, they may well deprive the most desperately helpless people of their only means for help. It seems obvious to me that they're conflating economic opportunity with safety, as it is the only viable political position left to them. As has been established elsewhere, companies do not owe workers a means to make money. I do not personally agree with deplatforming, but there is currently no right to a job, and, if such a right was to exist, it would not be possible to administer it fairly depending on the relative oppression/privilege of a person. On the other hand, I guess accrued wealth and number of potential income sources could be seen as reducing the likelihood of homelessness and perhaps we should use this to determine whether a loss of income could affect somebody's safety. (In this case I think that's unlikely: there are so many other online social networks that are supportive.)

by lhnz 9y ago

timthelion 9y ago

I guess the key phrase there is "leverage". Does your performace succeed? In the case of trans people on US coasts, this seems to be changing. For a short time, their identity had leverage, but the fact that this discussion is criticizing the authors of the letter for trying to leverage trans victim-hood, suggests that this leverage is waning. As an example of a group without victim-hood leverage, see NAMBLA [1], which represents another sexual orientation, but one which bears no leverage. Another victimized group with seemingly no leverage are those victims of child abuse who are suffering from multiple personality disorder. I know, in the abstract one would say that a victim of child abuse certainly has leverage, but if you read the appeals by those who suffer from severe psychological disorders as a result, you will immediately feel yourself recoil in disgust and grant them no audience. People tend to not see "monsters" as victims, and if we find people too weird or frightening we don't see them as victims. What other groups have no leverage? Perhaps some drug users, we tend to blame them for their problems. I would argue, that leverage is sometimes directly related to power. For example, the Jews were rich before WWII, and are still rich today. Since the holocaust, their victim-hood has born unparalleled leverage. However, in the same holocaust, the Roma people of the Czech Republic were treated just as badly as the Jews, and being poor, far fewer of them escaped. Yet the Roma have almost no leverage from their holocaust victim-hood. But do you think that trans people have power? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Man/Boy_Love_Association https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Man/Boy_Love_As...

lhnz 9y ago
> But do you think that trans people have power? In this particular case this identity is instrumentalised in order to modify the behaviour of Patreon. This simply wouldn't be done so readily unless the identity within this context carried power. I do not think that trans people in general have power. However, a lack of power in one context, can sometimes be an arbitrage opportunity in contexts where an oppressed identity is currency. I'm not against this but the underlying power dynamics are too interesting to be ignored. That said, I dislike the usage of the phrase "literally scared for their lives". This phrase is meant to be used to call on others to defend lives and here it is being used to call on other's to defend an ability to make money selling porn. Crying wolf undermines the ability for truly endangered people to ask for help. It is ethically repulsive to me that people that consider themselves good dilute the meaning of cries for help for base political expediency. By doing this, they may well deprive the most desperately helpless people of their only means for help. It seems obvious to me that they're conflating economic opportunity with safety, as it is the only viable political position left to them. As has been established elsewhere, companies do not owe workers a means to make money. I do not personally agree with deplatforming, but there is currently no right to a job, and, if such a right was to exist, it would not be possible to administer it fairly depending on the relative oppression/privilege of a person. On the other hand, I guess accrued wealth and number of potential income sources could be seen as reducing the likelihood of homelessness and perhaps we should use this to determine whether a loss of income could affect somebody's safety. (In this case I think that's unlikely: there are so many other online social networks that are supportive.)