4 ms·

She's a professor and aims to be a public intellectual; she's written a book. I really think this in and of itself is invitation for dialogue. Also, our relatio

She's a professor and aims to be a public intellectual; she's written a book. I really think this in and of itself is invitation for dialogue. Also, our relationship was been fine talking about politics when I agreed with her, but any disagreement was treated as hostile/moral failure on my part. I'm really pretty good at listening and being respectful; these sorts of failure modes in communication in my life have come exclusively with dedicated self-identified activists.

throwaway82652 5y ago
I don't think you can't really blame someone for that when their activism is a core part of their identity. People wouldn't become activists if they weren't deeply affected by these things. It's not their prerogative to (in their view) waste time with people who are just going to argue and push in the other direction. That's my experience from talking to a lot of activists, anyway. They have to be very careful to pick their battles.
- gonehome 5y ago
  Sure you can? Someone can be affected by things and still end up with false beliefs. It’s possible to still be kind to someone and argue a belief they hold is wrong. What’s true can be in conflict with deeply held beliefs (and often is). Part of the core issue is when one side won’t engage in actual discussion of the content and only argues at the meta level about identity. I think roflc0ptic’s examples are good ones - thankfully it seems the discourse around this kind of stuff is shifting back to being more moderate.
  - throwaway82652 5y ago
    You're absolutely correct, but that still isn't helpful to someone who is already committed to being a single-issue activist. You're taking completely the wrong angle. You have to address the why and not the belief itself. Edit: It's not particularly important or relevant to what's been said here if you see the mainstream discourse as shifting to being "more moderate". This is a given with any single-issue activist, it's your business if you deal in organizing activists. The shift to being moderate only happens through this process, there's no other process. If you don't concern yourself with organizing activists, then this isn't your wheelhouse, and I don't see why it was brought up.
    - gonehome 5y ago
      Ah I understand - you’re commenting more on strategy around being able to get through to someone when a core value is in conflict with what may be true. Yeah, on that I agree - requires more deft communication skills. I think you can still “blame them” for holding false beliefs though (or phrased differently not give them a free pass on dogma) while still understanding it’s going to be an emotional thing for them, but this sounds like it might be us just disputing definitions over “blame” and we mostly agree.
- roflc0ptic 5y ago
  > It's not their prerogative to (in their view) waste time with people who are just going to argue and push in the other direction I think this is a good point. An issue that coexists with this is that activist circles here in the 20x0s, of which I have been both a part and adjacent to, are in general not open to evaluating the truth value of their beliefs under any circumstances, not even around questions like "is this tactically/rhetorically an effective strategy?". There's also a related issue where basically their only tool for communicating across difference is opprobrium. You can see this laid out persuasively in this (uncommonly good) quilette article: https://quillette.com/2021/01/17/three-plane-rides-and-the-quest-for-a-just-society/ https://quillette.com/2021/01/17/three-plane-rides-and-the-q... What you're describing is an activist culture that has writ large given up on convincing people of their correctness, and functions instead via social coercion. And sure, there was a combative element to the civil rights movement - we're on the bus, you can't fucking ignore us - but it was coupled with cogence and reason. I'm pretty sure microaggressions exist, and also think they're a toxic framework for evaluating the world.
  - throwaway82652 5y ago
    >What you're describing is an activist culture that has writ large given up on convincing people of their correctness, and functions instead via social coercion. No, not at all and I'm very confused as to how you managed to connect those dots. I'm describing a culture where people make their activism an immutable part of their identity because it's all they know and they have no reason to pursue outside perspectives; if you're in a marginalized group it can be very easy to end up in a situation where there's nobody to look out for you besides yourself. This is not a new happening in any way shape or form, from my knowledge it's been this way for as long as there's been free societies that allowed protesting. This is what the civil rights movement was built on. It just doesn't happen if there isn't an outside condition to allow activism and protesting in the first place. Can there toxic social pressure in activist spaces? Absolutely, but that can be present in any social group where there are leaders and followers. That also isn't new in any way at all. I take it you haven't spend much time on social media in the last decade or so?
    - 5y ago

throwaway82652 5y ago

I don't think you can't really blame someone for that when their activism is a core part of their identity. People wouldn't become activists if they weren't deeply affected by these things. It's not their prerogative to (in their view) waste time with people who are just going to argue and push in the other direction. That's my experience from talking to a lot of activists, anyway. They have to be very careful to pick their battles.

gonehome 5y ago
Sure you can? Someone can be affected by things and still end up with false beliefs. It’s possible to still be kind to someone and argue a belief they hold is wrong. What’s true can be in conflict with deeply held beliefs (and often is). Part of the core issue is when one side won’t engage in actual discussion of the content and only argues at the meta level about identity. I think roflc0ptic’s examples are good ones - thankfully it seems the discourse around this kind of stuff is shifting back to being more moderate.
- throwaway82652 5y ago
  You're absolutely correct, but that still isn't helpful to someone who is already committed to being a single-issue activist. You're taking completely the wrong angle. You have to address the why and not the belief itself. Edit: It's not particularly important or relevant to what's been said here if you see the mainstream discourse as shifting to being "more moderate". This is a given with any single-issue activist, it's your business if you deal in organizing activists. The shift to being moderate only happens through this process, there's no other process. If you don't concern yourself with organizing activists, then this isn't your wheelhouse, and I don't see why it was brought up.
  - gonehome 5y ago
    Ah I understand - you’re commenting more on strategy around being able to get through to someone when a core value is in conflict with what may be true. Yeah, on that I agree - requires more deft communication skills. I think you can still “blame them” for holding false beliefs though (or phrased differently not give them a free pass on dogma) while still understanding it’s going to be an emotional thing for them, but this sounds like it might be us just disputing definitions over “blame” and we mostly agree.
roflc0ptic 5y ago
> It's not their prerogative to (in their view) waste time with people who are just going to argue and push in the other direction I think this is a good point. An issue that coexists with this is that activist circles here in the 20x0s, of which I have been both a part and adjacent to, are in general not open to evaluating the truth value of their beliefs under any circumstances, not even around questions like "is this tactically/rhetorically an effective strategy?". There's also a related issue where basically their only tool for communicating across difference is opprobrium. You can see this laid out persuasively in this (uncommonly good) quilette article: https://quillette.com/2021/01/17/three-plane-rides-and-the-quest-for-a-just-society/ https://quillette.com/2021/01/17/three-plane-rides-and-the-q... What you're describing is an activist culture that has writ large given up on convincing people of their correctness, and functions instead via social coercion. And sure, there was a combative element to the civil rights movement - we're on the bus, you can't fucking ignore us - but it was coupled with cogence and reason. I'm pretty sure microaggressions exist, and also think they're a toxic framework for evaluating the world.
- throwaway82652 5y ago
  >What you're describing is an activist culture that has writ large given up on convincing people of their correctness, and functions instead via social coercion. No, not at all and I'm very confused as to how you managed to connect those dots. I'm describing a culture where people make their activism an immutable part of their identity because it's all they know and they have no reason to pursue outside perspectives; if you're in a marginalized group it can be very easy to end up in a situation where there's nobody to look out for you besides yourself. This is not a new happening in any way shape or form, from my knowledge it's been this way for as long as there's been free societies that allowed protesting. This is what the civil rights movement was built on. It just doesn't happen if there isn't an outside condition to allow activism and protesting in the first place. Can there toxic social pressure in activist spaces? Absolutely, but that can be present in any social group where there are leaders and followers. That also isn't new in any way at all. I take it you haven't spend much time on social media in the last decade or so?
  - 5y ago