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Everyone is all for fairness and equality but, as is becoming increasingly clear, "social justice" as a movement has little, if anything, to do with actual fair

Everyone is all for fairness and equality but, as is becoming increasingly clear, "social justice" as a movement has little, if anything, to do with actual fairness or equality. Oberlin College's misbehavior may be at the extremum but it is far from the only example of this. Even on as pro-left a site as HN, people are realizing that this movement is more of a problem than a force for good and that one can be a liberal without necessarily being a progressive and vice-versa.

User23 7y ago
SJWism is a revanchist ideology and posture and as such it will never lead to anything other than negative sum outcomes. Since the readership here is well above average in intelligence, it’s unsurprising that a destructive ideology is met with some skepticism. Edit: Why on earth is this flagged? The article we're discussing is exactly a negative sum outcome.
- Nasrudith 7y ago
  I'll bite - how the hell can it be revanchist in even the worst sorts of strawman? Revanchism is an ideology about reclaiming all territorial losses. The always negative outcome claim is questionable - even considering that it in order for it to be successful by definition they need overwhelming might to reclaim to hold it and it will impair peace for lesser processes. If massively and hopelessly overpowered like say a hypothetical small subset of radicals in the Cherokee Nation proposing to annex large sections of the United States it can pretty safely be declared 'long lost cause'. That isn't really applicable to anything "Social Justice" - even metaphorically. The closest thing for revauncism would be found in white supremacists and chauvinists who believe they should have complete domain over society by being sole holders of rights or 'rights' over other people. And even then that is a metaphor confused and stretched so thin that it is akin to thinking all alcohol should be kept far away from national borders for fear that if spilled it could erase the lines because it could do so to ink on a map.
clairity 7y ago
but what is "the movement"? the situation here seems like small-time stupidity and jerkiness (of behavior), not a movement. just to note, group-labeling people tends to undermine openness and short-circuits revelation, so i'd like to avoid that (especially dichotomies like left-right and liberal-conservative).
damnyou 7y ago
The social justice movement was responsible for the general expectation in polite society to not misgender trans people, so it's clearly had material benefits. This is not to say that there aren't extreme elements, but shifting the center of gravity of society to a fairer place does involve some extreme elements. It's like how RMS is the crazy extremist free software guy, and that gives the rest of us cover to share our or our employers' code freely with the world.

User23 7y ago

SJWism is a revanchist ideology and posture and as such it will never lead to anything other than negative sum outcomes. Since the readership here is well above average in intelligence, it’s unsurprising that a destructive ideology is met with some skepticism. Edit: Why on earth is this flagged? The article we're discussing is exactly a negative sum outcome.

Nasrudith 7y ago
I'll bite - how the hell can it be revanchist in even the worst sorts of strawman? Revanchism is an ideology about reclaiming all territorial losses. The always negative outcome claim is questionable - even considering that it in order for it to be successful by definition they need overwhelming might to reclaim to hold it and it will impair peace for lesser processes. If massively and hopelessly overpowered like say a hypothetical small subset of radicals in the Cherokee Nation proposing to annex large sections of the United States it can pretty safely be declared 'long lost cause'. That isn't really applicable to anything "Social Justice" - even metaphorically. The closest thing for revauncism would be found in white supremacists and chauvinists who believe they should have complete domain over society by being sole holders of rights or 'rights' over other people. And even then that is a metaphor confused and stretched so thin that it is akin to thinking all alcohol should be kept far away from national borders for fear that if spilled it could erase the lines because it could do so to ink on a map.

clairity 7y ago

but what is "the movement"? the situation here seems like small-time stupidity and jerkiness (of behavior), not a movement. just to note, group-labeling people tends to undermine openness and short-circuits revelation, so i'd like to avoid that (especially dichotomies like left-right and liberal-conservative).

damnyou 7y ago

The social justice movement was responsible for the general expectation in polite society to not misgender trans people, so it's clearly had material benefits. This is not to say that there aren't extreme elements, but shifting the center of gravity of society to a fairer place does involve some extreme elements. It's like how RMS is the crazy extremist free software guy, and that gives the rest of us cover to share our or our employers' code freely with the world.