4 ms·

I know it doesn't feel that way right now, but there is probably no time in history where racism, sexism, homophobia, classism, religious hatred, slavery, etc.

I know it doesn't feel that way right now, but there is probably no time in history where racism, sexism, homophobia, classism, religious hatred, slavery, etc. were less normalized than right now. These things are sadly all too common, there's lots of work to do, and we must not be complacent about past successes. But when I was a kid, homosexuality was illegal. Twenty years ago gay fear and stupid women were typical jokes on most sitcoms. Some of our grandmothers could not vote. Swimming pools and schools - schools! - were racially segregated within a lifetime. Contrary to your post, we have been gradually escaping from the extreme crazy bad ideas. Let's keep it up.

zozbot234 4y ago
You're looking at a tiny elite slice of the modern West (I mean, sitcoms? Seriously?) and taking it as representative of the whole world. There's probably a whole lot more homophobia, misogyny and religious hatred now in some highly religious countries than there was 25 years ago or so. And the Internet is even less representative.
- kaesar14 4y ago
  By an absolute quantity or an absolute measure? I daresay at least in India, the toleration for homosexuality, women, and general non-conformity is quite higher than it used to be. Casteism and religious hatred still exists in great quantity but has it improved relative to 1950? Probably? Things are not perfect but you’re underrating how awful they used to be.
  - mjcohen 4y ago
    Are you kidding? With what Modi has done and is continuing to do, India is becoming far more repressive. It is another one of the countries I would fear to visit because of reactions to what I might say.
    - robotresearcher 4y ago
      Until just seventy five years ago India had been ruled for a century by an emperor in London and an occupying army, exploiting caste discrimination, religious sectarianism and regional rivalries to keep Indians subjugated for the profit of a racist colonial Empire. At partition, the rival religious hacked each other to bits wholesale. So, despite setbacks, maybe there has been real progress in what is now the worlds largest democracy.
    - kaesar14 4y ago
      Yes, there are recent setbacks, but you really need to put yourself back in time to where India was in the earlier part of the 20th century. Caste discrimination was fully legal. Women had next to 0 legal rights over themselves and their property. The Partition of India was the most violent outburst of religious violence that has occurred in human history. There are many problems in contemporary India but I would suggest you not generalize the average Indian in this way. Many young people are quite open minded and quite westernized in their attitudes towards social issues. Modi’s victories in Parliament are complicated and not all driven by religious intolerance.
  - bongoman37 4y ago
- robotresearcher 4y ago
  Do you think Asia and Africa don’t have sitcoms?
- elil17 4y ago
  I agree that things don't move in one direction all the time. Iran, for instance has certainly de-liberalized (although they might be re-liberalizing, fingers crossed). The overall trend in the past couple centuries seems to be towards tolerance, though. As an example, in most countries at least a quarter of people think being gay is okay [1]. 100 years ago, where on Earth could you have gotten 25 out of a hundred people to say that being gay is okay? Perhaps in Berlin in the 1920s, but no where else as far as I know. https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2013/06/04/the-global-divide-on-homosexuality/ https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2013/06/04/the-global-div...
- educaysean 4y ago
  You're curious about the non-western perspective? I can tell you that social changes are arriving at a much faster pace in Asia than what we're experiencing in the west. This isn't because the Asian countries are more progressive, but because the baseline was simply lower. The west is indeed in the lead, but most countries are following closely behind, and more importantly, they're all headed in the same direction. Think about it. Everyone is now consuming the same Tiktok, reddit, Netflix, music, video games globally. Twitter isn't some hidden cove only westerners have access to. The world is following along as George Floyd is brutally murdered in the street. Have you seen Parasite or Squid Game? They deal directly with topics like class struggle / racism and they resonated with people all over the earth. The fact that South Korean media is even producing media such as these would've been unthinkable just 20 years ago. Annual gay parade have started take place in Seoul since 2015, and interracial marriage numbers have never been higher. I'm sure there are outlier nations who have faced regression in their cultural maturity since, but they're anything but the representative sample and claiming otherwise would be disingenuous. So no, this isn't something cooked up by the bored progressives of the U.S. This is not some obscure domain reserved for the western elites. This is where the world is headed towards - the westerners simply got there before the rest of us.
stubish 4y ago
Do you have any evidence that the denormalization of racism etc. is because of social media? Or that social media even helped? The ongoing fight to change the things you cite all predate social media by decades or more. Even with the Arab Spring, was social media helpful or just the tool used to coordinate? Would it have happened anyway without Twitter being there as a means to broadcast? A common criticism I have heard of social media is that it is so easy to just retweet/like and wave the flag that many people stop doing anything meaningful and visible outside the echo chamber entirely.
- MrVandemar 4y ago
  I don't think OP is arguing that social media is leading to the denormalisation of racism; I think OP is noting that, whatever other madness we are dealing with in this day and age, there are some issues in the past that were crazy, abusive, exploitative and damaging, and that they have gotten much, much better over time.
8bitsrule 4y ago
Well said. In a time when people didn't question their gender, many of them might have felt themselves to be alone in their feelings. They not only learned to suppress their feelings (to avoid ridicule or worse), they were unable to understand them because literature was oppressed. Much self-isolation, even tragedy ensued. In many "less civilized cultures" these differences were not an excuse for abuse, but were recognized, even exalted ... until the colonizers came along with their 'truths'. Exploring, understanding and accepting ourselves is an important step, for -all- of us, not just the typicals. "To thine own self be true..."
tnel77 4y ago
I don’t feel like either of you are wrong. We have made amazing cultural advances while also taking steps backwards. I love the internet (and technology in general), but at what point do we say enough is enough when you address the points that OP has made? Edit: Never stop making things better in terms of equality, but perhaps we shouldn’t celebrate cancel culture or people getting internet points for gender confusion.

zozbot234 4y ago

You're looking at a tiny elite slice of the modern West (I mean, sitcoms? Seriously?) and taking it as representative of the whole world. There's probably a whole lot more homophobia, misogyny and religious hatred now in some highly religious countries than there was 25 years ago or so. And the Internet is even less representative.

kaesar14 4y ago
By an absolute quantity or an absolute measure? I daresay at least in India, the toleration for homosexuality, women, and general non-conformity is quite higher than it used to be. Casteism and religious hatred still exists in great quantity but has it improved relative to 1950? Probably? Things are not perfect but you’re underrating how awful they used to be.
- mjcohen 4y ago
  Are you kidding? With what Modi has done and is continuing to do, India is becoming far more repressive. It is another one of the countries I would fear to visit because of reactions to what I might say.
  - robotresearcher 4y ago
    Until just seventy five years ago India had been ruled for a century by an emperor in London and an occupying army, exploiting caste discrimination, religious sectarianism and regional rivalries to keep Indians subjugated for the profit of a racist colonial Empire. At partition, the rival religious hacked each other to bits wholesale. So, despite setbacks, maybe there has been real progress in what is now the worlds largest democracy.
  - kaesar14 4y ago
    Yes, there are recent setbacks, but you really need to put yourself back in time to where India was in the earlier part of the 20th century. Caste discrimination was fully legal. Women had next to 0 legal rights over themselves and their property. The Partition of India was the most violent outburst of religious violence that has occurred in human history. There are many problems in contemporary India but I would suggest you not generalize the average Indian in this way. Many young people are quite open minded and quite westernized in their attitudes towards social issues. Modi’s victories in Parliament are complicated and not all driven by religious intolerance.
- bongoman37 4y ago
robotresearcher 4y ago
Do you think Asia and Africa don’t have sitcoms?
elil17 4y ago
I agree that things don't move in one direction all the time. Iran, for instance has certainly de-liberalized (although they might be re-liberalizing, fingers crossed). The overall trend in the past couple centuries seems to be towards tolerance, though. As an example, in most countries at least a quarter of people think being gay is okay [1]. 100 years ago, where on Earth could you have gotten 25 out of a hundred people to say that being gay is okay? Perhaps in Berlin in the 1920s, but no where else as far as I know. https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2013/06/04/the-global-divide-on-homosexuality/ https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2013/06/04/the-global-div...
educaysean 4y ago
You're curious about the non-western perspective? I can tell you that social changes are arriving at a much faster pace in Asia than what we're experiencing in the west. This isn't because the Asian countries are more progressive, but because the baseline was simply lower. The west is indeed in the lead, but most countries are following closely behind, and more importantly, they're all headed in the same direction. Think about it. Everyone is now consuming the same Tiktok, reddit, Netflix, music, video games globally. Twitter isn't some hidden cove only westerners have access to. The world is following along as George Floyd is brutally murdered in the street. Have you seen Parasite or Squid Game? They deal directly with topics like class struggle / racism and they resonated with people all over the earth. The fact that South Korean media is even producing media such as these would've been unthinkable just 20 years ago. Annual gay parade have started take place in Seoul since 2015, and interracial marriage numbers have never been higher. I'm sure there are outlier nations who have faced regression in their cultural maturity since, but they're anything but the representative sample and claiming otherwise would be disingenuous. So no, this isn't something cooked up by the bored progressives of the U.S. This is not some obscure domain reserved for the western elites. This is where the world is headed towards - the westerners simply got there before the rest of us.

stubish 4y ago

Do you have any evidence that the denormalization of racism etc. is because of social media? Or that social media even helped? The ongoing fight to change the things you cite all predate social media by decades or more. Even with the Arab Spring, was social media helpful or just the tool used to coordinate? Would it have happened anyway without Twitter being there as a means to broadcast? A common criticism I have heard of social media is that it is so easy to just retweet/like and wave the flag that many people stop doing anything meaningful and visible outside the echo chamber entirely.

MrVandemar 4y ago
I don't think OP is arguing that social media is leading to the denormalisation of racism; I think OP is noting that, whatever other madness we are dealing with in this day and age, there are some issues in the past that were crazy, abusive, exploitative and damaging, and that they have gotten much, much better over time.

8bitsrule 4y ago

Well said. In a time when people didn't question their gender, many of them might have felt themselves to be alone in their feelings. They not only learned to suppress their feelings (to avoid ridicule or worse), they were unable to understand them because literature was oppressed. Much self-isolation, even tragedy ensued. In many "less civilized cultures" these differences were not an excuse for abuse, but were recognized, even exalted ... until the colonizers came along with their 'truths'. Exploring, understanding and accepting ourselves is an important step, for -all- of us, not just the typicals. "To thine own self be true..."

tnel77 4y ago

I don’t feel like either of you are wrong. We have made amazing cultural advances while also taking steps backwards. I love the internet (and technology in general), but at what point do we say enough is enough when you address the points that OP has made? Edit: Never stop making things better in terms of equality, but perhaps we shouldn’t celebrate cancel culture or people getting internet points for gender confusion.