4 ms·

> Reddit recently banned a ton of subreddits that are simply critical of the idea that men can literally become women This is a deeply misleading way of unders

> Reddit recently banned a ton of subreddits that are simply critical of the idea that men can literally become women This is a deeply misleading way of understanding this controversy. You can be "simply critical" of the way we define gender or of reddit's policies without being an asshole. "Inclusive" behavior consists, essentially, of just not being an asshole. If someone tells you they're a woman and you don't agree, that's fine. Let them be them and you be you. Complain if you're actually harmed, or if you think someone needs to be defended. If you start a subreddit dedicated to the notion that trans women aren't "really women" and share a bunch of memes making fun of them, that's crossing the line. That's who got banned. ... Edit ... Good grief. I started looking up the rest of your evidence (I only knew the trans hate subreddits thing a priori), and it's all equivalently spun. You're are NOT arguing in good faith here: 1. Hammer_Of_Glass was not "banned" from twitter. The account was locked for a few hours, then released when reviewed. It was clearly a mistake. 2. /r/PCOS went through a mod shakeup due to anti-trans comments getting out of hand on a forum that was supposed to be about medical issues and social support for sufferers. The community as a whole seems to be entirely behind the new focus. 3. Meghan Murphy was banned from twitter after a long history of anti-trans activism (including two instances of doxxing otherwise-anonymous trans twitter users), not one tweet and certainly not one pronoun. 4. I don't know what you're talking about with Youtube. The amount of anti-trans hate on that site is staggering.

dvt 6y ago
> share a bunch of memes making fun of them Making fun of people is crossing the line? This seems like a dangerous slippery slope to say the least. Suppose I make an entire career out of making fun of (say) Irish people. Jokes and stereotypes like "they drink a lot" and "they get into bar fights" and "they're dumb potato farmers" are my bread and butter. Most people would probably agree that this kind of speech should be protected. However, because trans rights, LGBT, race, etc. has been so profusely politicized, it's become a third rail. Making fun of a trans person and an Irish person are, for whatever reason, not on the same playing field any more. I'm not sure what the solution is, but let's not pretend there's no problem.
- newacct583 6y ago
  You picked Irish men (note your stereotypes: all male) because they're reasonably elite in modern US society and so this seems harmless. Repeat the analysis with jokes about women ("so emotional"), blacks ("criminal"), mexicans ("rapists" -- I think someone tried this once, even), arabs ("rag heads"), republicans ("nazis"), etc... Tell me you want all that stuff on your website. But because you and your Irish buddies feel immune, everyone else needs thicker skin? I mean, this really should be morally obvious. Laughing with someone (which is how you imagine those Irish drinking jokes) is having fun. Laughing at someone (needless to say there were no welcomed trans users on those banned subreddits) is being an asshole. Reddit banned a bunch of assholes.
  - dvt 6y ago
    > You picked Irish men (note your stereotypes: all male) You're obviously not arguing in good faith, as I am quite careful with my words and specifically mentioned people. But I do agree that thick skin is a requirement of a free and open society (this is where I'd usually cite J.S. Mill's On Liberty). Finally, I just want to add that your conclusion is off-base: anti-Irish sentiment (known as Hibernophobia) has a long and storied history.
    - newacct583 6y ago
      > anti-Irish sentiment (known as Hibernophobia) has a long and storied history. OK, then let's ban the mean Irish jokes too.
      - dvt 6y ago
        Q.E.D.
        kbenson 6y ago
        There are times when a rationalist approach to societal and cultural issues (and political issues, as they bleed into that) may be more or less acceptable to the public, and I think we are unfortunately at a time where those approaches don't work very well, and indeed are seen as attacks themselves. I have all sorts of poorly founded ideas on why that might be so, which themselves might be more symptoms than causes, but the bottom line is the same; It's very hard to have a rational discussion between two parties with different points of view these days. I find that one or both will usually have underlying beliefs based on dogma that they refuse to entertain any discussion on, which makes discussing views founded on those beliefs extremely hard to do constructively, if not impossible.

dvt 6y ago

> share a bunch of memes making fun of them Making fun of people is crossing the line? This seems like a dangerous slippery slope to say the least. Suppose I make an entire career out of making fun of (say) Irish people. Jokes and stereotypes like "they drink a lot" and "they get into bar fights" and "they're dumb potato farmers" are my bread and butter. Most people would probably agree that this kind of speech should be protected. However, because trans rights, LGBT, race, etc. has been so profusely politicized, it's become a third rail. Making fun of a trans person and an Irish person are, for whatever reason, not on the same playing field any more. I'm not sure what the solution is, but let's not pretend there's no problem.

newacct583 6y ago
You picked Irish men (note your stereotypes: all male) because they're reasonably elite in modern US society and so this seems harmless. Repeat the analysis with jokes about women ("so emotional"), blacks ("criminal"), mexicans ("rapists" -- I think someone tried this once, even), arabs ("rag heads"), republicans ("nazis"), etc... Tell me you want all that stuff on your website. But because you and your Irish buddies feel immune, everyone else needs thicker skin? I mean, this really should be morally obvious. Laughing with someone (which is how you imagine those Irish drinking jokes) is having fun. Laughing at someone (needless to say there were no welcomed trans users on those banned subreddits) is being an asshole. Reddit banned a bunch of assholes.
- dvt 6y ago
  > You picked Irish men (note your stereotypes: all male) You're obviously not arguing in good faith, as I am quite careful with my words and specifically mentioned people. But I do agree that thick skin is a requirement of a free and open society (this is where I'd usually cite J.S. Mill's On Liberty). Finally, I just want to add that your conclusion is off-base: anti-Irish sentiment (known as Hibernophobia) has a long and storied history.
  - newacct583 6y ago
    > anti-Irish sentiment (known as Hibernophobia) has a long and storied history. OK, then let's ban the mean Irish jokes too.
    - dvt 6y ago
      Q.E.D.
      - kbenson 6y ago
        There are times when a rationalist approach to societal and cultural issues (and political issues, as they bleed into that) may be more or less acceptable to the public, and I think we are unfortunately at a time where those approaches don't work very well, and indeed are seen as attacks themselves. I have all sorts of poorly founded ideas on why that might be so, which themselves might be more symptoms than causes, but the bottom line is the same; It's very hard to have a rational discussion between two parties with different points of view these days. I find that one or both will usually have underlying beliefs based on dogma that they refuse to entertain any discussion on, which makes discussing views founded on those beliefs extremely hard to do constructively, if not impossible.