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Most people aren't offended when someone accidently uses the wrong pronoun. They do get offended when people purposefully use the wrong pronoun to intentionally
by amanaplanacanal 4y ago
Most people aren't offended when someone accidently uses the wrong pronoun. They do get offended when people purposefully use the wrong pronoun to intentionally offend. Pretending that those are the same thing is part of the problem.
- ls612 4y agoMany people feign offense at benign things to gain power over others.
- dijit 4y agoI have experienced this too. People will play on social cues to gain benefit, it doesn't matter which social cue. The idea that every person with non-standard pronouns is a good person is misguided, even if it was an overwhelming majority. The capacity for self-centeredness and/or bullying behaviour exists in all demographics.
- ls612 4y agoEveryone is out to benefit themselves and those they like no matter the consequences for others. People ignore that at their own peril.
- dijit 4y agoThat’s reductionist. All people have morals; the ones to be fearful of are the ones that allow their morality to bend depending on the recipient.
- ls612 4y agoIts a hueristic, its quite literally wrong but it is a quick and useful guide.
- s1artibartfast 4y agoUseful in some contexts, disastrous in others. The challenge with all heuristics is having the wisdom to know when to apply them. I think the self interest heuristic is generally overused.
- ls612 4y agoI guess I disagree, self interest is generally underestimated to disastrous result. The reason being that if you assume someone is out only for themselves and are wrong you lose very little. If you assume the opposite wrongly it is very costly. The way I see it we are fundamentally the same species which committed all of the atrocities of the 20th century, 19th century, heck all of the extremely violent and callous behavior in recorded history. To believe that human nature has changed much from that in only the span of a few decades is foolhardy.
- em-bee 4y agoit's not that simple. if i just assume that someone is out for themselves, and as a result i reject or ignore them then i'll never find any friends. so i need to assume that most people are not just out for themselves and engage others hoping that they are not, but maybe just be cautious until i know them better.
- s1artibartfast 4y agoHow many wars and atrocities of the 20th century were caused by this heuristic as well? If you assume most people are out for themselves, the rational solution is usually to violently suppress or exterminate your opposition whenever possible. Kill them before they have a chance to kill you.
- deterministic 4y agoNope. Sociopaths don’t have morals. And most people will do immoral things if the value/cost is high enough.
- jandorn 4y agoAfter all that he said, this is what you decided to comment on? I guess he was right on the money.
- citilife 4y ago> They do get offended when people purposefully use the wrong pronoun to intentionally offend. Pretending that those are the same thing is part of the problem. "the problem"... You don't get to choose what other people call you. Confident, hardworking people, don't don't care what others call them. "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me" is a common phrase school children say. I've been called a plethora of names, that doesn't define me, why let others define you (so to speak)? This is exactly the coddling I was discussing. The purpose of pronouns are to help others understand who you're talking about. It's not to validate the individual being discussed. Confident people don't need validation.
- dallashoxton 4y ago
- rowanG077 4y agoIn some sense I agree. But on the other hand I also don't think we should be OK with rampant bullying. Many lives have been lost just because a group of people determined they want to bullying someone.
- hoorible 4y ago“You don’t get to choose what other people call you” What? That’s literally the definition of a legal name change, which happens all the time. If someone continued to, intentionally, refer to my wife’s maiden name after she went through the nightmare process of changing it, you can bet she’d be offended, and rightfully so. Being offended by behaviour being done specifically to offend isn’t being coddled or a sign of weakness, and it’s frankly kind of weird that you think it is. Sure, she can’t technically “choose” if someone continues to be a jerk and call her by the wrong name, but the social convention of respecting given names has existed forever, and extending that same logic to pronouns seems like a pretty fair expectation of basic human decency to me. You’re seriously saying that if everyone around you referred to you as “miss” or “ma’am”, forever, that wouldn’t start to get to you? (I’m assuming you’re male, I find it hard to believe a woman would have written this) I’ll believe it when I see it. I’ve met plenty of men who like to think they’re that confident, but yet to meet a man who actually is.