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I think you might want to reflect for a minute on why you thought "but do you know how virulent some of those communities were to just about everyone?" was an a

I think you might want to reflect for a minute on why you thought "but do you know how virulent some of those communities were to just about everyone?" was an appropriate response to a black person talking about their experience of racism. I recognize you believed yourself to be mitigating the effect of your statement by prefacing it with "Not disputing your bad experiences," but I think you'll find that the net effect of your comment is still one of dismissing a black person's lived experience, or at least pulling focus away from it in an unhelpful way.

JLCarveth 4y ago
And you're here dismissing their experience because they're not black. See the issue?
- mostly_lurks 4y ago
  Being dismissive of the experiences of members of oppressed groups is objectively more harmful than being dismissive of someone not part of a similarly oppressed group.
meowkit 4y ago
And to counter your claim here - someone's "lived experience" is not a sufficient ballast for blindly accepting an anecdote. People's memories suck. And more often than not subjective experiences don't map onto reality, especially when negative or stressful emotions are involved. One negative experience on an IRC/forum can cloud a person's entire recollection simply on the basis of the Negativity Bias. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negativity_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negativity_bias
- The5thElephant 4y ago
  The point isn't to figure out whether these communities were a net positive or negative. I wasn't a target of any of the racism, sexism, homophobia, etc on these forums and chat rooms but I sure saw a lot of it everywhere I participated at a level that was kind of ridiculous in some cases. It clearly had impact on the people it was targeting, the degree to which it "clouds a persons recollection" is entirely irrelevant. Is your point that their recollection should be dismissed? That they were too sensitive? It's unclear what this response's intent is.
  - dcow 4y ago
    I think the point was that you can’t debate or argue with anecdotes, in essence dismissing both comments.
dbrueck 4y ago
Hmm... this sounds an awful lot like, "because you're responding to a comment made by a black person, the only acceptable response is one of total agreement". I think you might want to reflect for a minute on the importance of nuance in a discussion, and the net effect of trying to police comments on others' behalf. I completely believe the commenter's experience, but I also witnessed the opposite a lot (and was deeply encouraged by it), and it's not wrong for me to chime in and point it out. And guess what? Experiencing vitriol on the internet directly contributed to me being more sensitive to things like racism. Although I've been on the receiving end of racist remarks offline, it wasn't until the internet that I caught a glimpse at how hurtful people could truly be. Again, not wrong for me to pipe up about it.
- The5thElephant 4y ago
  But it is unclear what you are disagreeing with. They never said that there was nothing positive in those communities. So what is the point of your comment? To make sure no one leaves this thread thinking that those communities were a net negative or something? I understand the desire to defend something you were a part of and got something positive out of, but the original commenter isn't criticizing people for enjoying or benefiting from those communities, they are pointing out that they had a clear negative impact on people who were targeted by those types of awful comments.
  - dcow 4y ago
    It’s unclear because you’ve concocted it. You’re asserting that there’s disagreement when there never was. I don’t strictly blame you for perpetuating ill rhetoric, but at least be aware that you’re responding to a stance that the comment in question never took in a fever to defend a black OP that never asked for any help and frankly IMO doesn't need it based on the high quality of their comment.
  - dbrueck 4y ago
    This is a discussion site, so not every comment needs to fit neatly in a 'agree' or 'disagree' bucket. That said, I'm in agreement with the comment I was replying to, and not actually defending anything at all - I meant for my comment to be taken at face value, nothing more.
naasking 4y ago
> but I think you'll find that the net effect of your comment is still one of dismissing a black person's lived experience Pointing out that those venues were full of anti-everything hate is not dismissing a black person's experience, it's validating it, while pointing out that he's not alone.
- ParetoOptimal 4y ago
  > Pointing out that those venues were full of anti-everything hate is not dismissing a black person's experience, it's validating it, while pointing out that he's not alone. But it implicitly implies the negative experiences were similar in scale unless otherwise noted. It downplays the very large weight that racism adds to the negativity of that experience even if the intent is a noble one of making that person not feel alone.
  - dcow 4y ago
    Or, maybe you’re the one projecting negativity for assuming that the existence of another anecdote downplays the black one in play? I give it no such credence.
    - mostly_lurks 4y ago
      "My mother died today." "Well, lots of peoples mothers died today." Do you not see how that response is problematic? How it downplays the person's experience?
      - dcow 4y ago
        Thats not an accurate reduction.
- mostly_lurks 4y ago
  Hate directed at black people, who have been exploited, oppressed, enslaved, killed, and more for over 400 years has a more significant and problematic impact than hate directed at other, more privileged groups. Recentering the conversation away from the black person's experience is a form of dismissal, not validation. An abuser on IRC calling a black person the n-word is objectively more harmful than an abuser on IRC calling pretty much anyone else pretty much any slur.
boppo1 4y ago
I think you might want to reflect for a minute that you are playing the exact DEI game that the OP is complaining about. You are dismissing your parent post's argument without addressing content of the argument. Essentially, your post boils down to "Don't argue with Black people. "Lived Experience" trumps all rhetoric and discussion. In the future, please keep your thoughts and concerns to yourself." You are fostering a culture without room for discussion. You are also presuming to speak for the Black person two posts up. Solidarity is important, but shutting people down based on racial context isn't it.
- mostly_lurks 4y ago
  I was not engaging with the argument made by the post I replied to because the poster's argument is completely beside the point. When someone says "I experienced racism because I'm black," the appropriate response is not "Well, actually, lots of people who aren't black experienced that terrible thing." So what if lots of non-black people experienced that terrible thing? That's not what we're talking about here. Your statement is re-centering the conversation away from the black person who's describing their experience. And you know what? It's the black people who are being routinely discriminated against, incarcerated, and killed because of racism, so maybe it's irrelevant to say "my feelings were hurt on IRC too."
  - boppo1 4y ago
    Are you Black?

JLCarveth 4y ago

And you're here dismissing their experience because they're not black. See the issue?

mostly_lurks 4y ago
Being dismissive of the experiences of members of oppressed groups is objectively more harmful than being dismissive of someone not part of a similarly oppressed group.

meowkit 4y ago

And to counter your claim here - someone's "lived experience" is not a sufficient ballast for blindly accepting an anecdote. People's memories suck. And more often than not subjective experiences don't map onto reality, especially when negative or stressful emotions are involved. One negative experience on an IRC/forum can cloud a person's entire recollection simply on the basis of the Negativity Bias. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negativity_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negativity_bias

The5thElephant 4y ago
The point isn't to figure out whether these communities were a net positive or negative. I wasn't a target of any of the racism, sexism, homophobia, etc on these forums and chat rooms but I sure saw a lot of it everywhere I participated at a level that was kind of ridiculous in some cases. It clearly had impact on the people it was targeting, the degree to which it "clouds a persons recollection" is entirely irrelevant. Is your point that their recollection should be dismissed? That they were too sensitive? It's unclear what this response's intent is.
- dcow 4y ago
  I think the point was that you can’t debate or argue with anecdotes, in essence dismissing both comments.

dbrueck 4y ago

Hmm... this sounds an awful lot like, "because you're responding to a comment made by a black person, the only acceptable response is one of total agreement". I think you might want to reflect for a minute on the importance of nuance in a discussion, and the net effect of trying to police comments on others' behalf. I completely believe the commenter's experience, but I also witnessed the opposite a lot (and was deeply encouraged by it), and it's not wrong for me to chime in and point it out. And guess what? Experiencing vitriol on the internet directly contributed to me being more sensitive to things like racism. Although I've been on the receiving end of racist remarks offline, it wasn't until the internet that I caught a glimpse at how hurtful people could truly be. Again, not wrong for me to pipe up about it.

The5thElephant 4y ago
But it is unclear what you are disagreeing with. They never said that there was nothing positive in those communities. So what is the point of your comment? To make sure no one leaves this thread thinking that those communities were a net negative or something? I understand the desire to defend something you were a part of and got something positive out of, but the original commenter isn't criticizing people for enjoying or benefiting from those communities, they are pointing out that they had a clear negative impact on people who were targeted by those types of awful comments.
- dcow 4y ago
  It’s unclear because you’ve concocted it. You’re asserting that there’s disagreement when there never was. I don’t strictly blame you for perpetuating ill rhetoric, but at least be aware that you’re responding to a stance that the comment in question never took in a fever to defend a black OP that never asked for any help and frankly IMO doesn't need it based on the high quality of their comment.
- dbrueck 4y ago
  This is a discussion site, so not every comment needs to fit neatly in a 'agree' or 'disagree' bucket. That said, I'm in agreement with the comment I was replying to, and not actually defending anything at all - I meant for my comment to be taken at face value, nothing more.

naasking 4y ago

> but I think you'll find that the net effect of your comment is still one of dismissing a black person's lived experience Pointing out that those venues were full of anti-everything hate is not dismissing a black person's experience, it's validating it, while pointing out that he's not alone.

ParetoOptimal 4y ago
> Pointing out that those venues were full of anti-everything hate is not dismissing a black person's experience, it's validating it, while pointing out that he's not alone. But it implicitly implies the negative experiences were similar in scale unless otherwise noted. It downplays the very large weight that racism adds to the negativity of that experience even if the intent is a noble one of making that person not feel alone.
- dcow 4y ago
  Or, maybe you’re the one projecting negativity for assuming that the existence of another anecdote downplays the black one in play? I give it no such credence.
  - mostly_lurks 4y ago
    "My mother died today." "Well, lots of peoples mothers died today." Do you not see how that response is problematic? How it downplays the person's experience?
    - dcow 4y ago
      Thats not an accurate reduction.
mostly_lurks 4y ago
Hate directed at black people, who have been exploited, oppressed, enslaved, killed, and more for over 400 years has a more significant and problematic impact than hate directed at other, more privileged groups. Recentering the conversation away from the black person's experience is a form of dismissal, not validation. An abuser on IRC calling a black person the n-word is objectively more harmful than an abuser on IRC calling pretty much anyone else pretty much any slur.

boppo1 4y ago

I think you might want to reflect for a minute that you are playing the exact DEI game that the OP is complaining about. You are dismissing your parent post's argument without addressing content of the argument. Essentially, your post boils down to "Don't argue with Black people. "Lived Experience" trumps all rhetoric and discussion. In the future, please keep your thoughts and concerns to yourself." You are fostering a culture without room for discussion. You are also presuming to speak for the Black person two posts up. Solidarity is important, but shutting people down based on racial context isn't it.

mostly_lurks 4y ago
I was not engaging with the argument made by the post I replied to because the poster's argument is completely beside the point. When someone says "I experienced racism because I'm black," the appropriate response is not "Well, actually, lots of people who aren't black experienced that terrible thing." So what if lots of non-black people experienced that terrible thing? That's not what we're talking about here. Your statement is re-centering the conversation away from the black person who's describing their experience. And you know what? It's the black people who are being routinely discriminated against, incarcerated, and killed because of racism, so maybe it's irrelevant to say "my feelings were hurt on IRC too."
- boppo1 4y ago
  Are you Black?