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It's terribly convenient to find some generic fault with the mere act of someone complaining. That way, you never have to engage with any specific incident. Ins
by IfOnlyYouKnew 6y ago
It's terribly convenient to find some generic fault with the mere act of someone complaining. That way, you never have to engage with any specific incident. Instead, just lump it together with any number of real or imaginary other complaints and derail any discussion of the merits with the counter-claim of the terrible harms of even having such a discussion.
It's like telling someone "stop being so defensive!". There is no rebuttal that a bit of bad faith cannot turn into evidence against the accused.
"Virtue Signalling", of course, is even better: just as generic, but the strength of the accusation increases proportionally to the perceived moral distance of the underlying, real argument. It's the perfect go-to argument when, by any other measure, you are advocating pure evil and the other side is annoyingly reasonable.
- Fellshard 6y agoIt would be wrong to attribute a single complaint to a life of virtue signaling, yes. This appears to be referring to a pattern of life, though: a mindset that perpetually explains and proactively seeks and finds virtue to be found in victimhood /alone/.
- lopmotr 6y agoI've seen people complaining about something unrelated (like a burglary) and include how especially bad it is for them because they're a single mother. Seemingly expecting more sympathy or help by showing what a victim they are. I'd say that's a bit manipulative. It doesn't mean all complaints are bad, but you don't have to mention your unrelated victimhood while complaining.
- GeneralTspoon 6y agoThe same event can affect different people differently... e.g. if Elon Musk gets burgled, he can always just buy new stuff... but if someone whose financial circumstances are worse got burgled (like perhaps a single mother), that would affect them more, since they might not be able to afford to replace their stolen goods so easily.