Free Speech and Creepy Liberalism

The hatred between trans activists and terfs are definitely real and intense.

as the first two words that make up TERF is "Trans-exclusionary", makes sense that they would exclusive trans.

they sometimes rub against classic feminists as well. we used to have a thing called LadyFest that was a yearly feminist festival and i heard gripes from many feminists about not getting a spot because it was taken by a band full of guys in dresses.

TERF is a dumb fucking term btw

i don't see the reason in declaring that you and only you get to decide what label you wear and yet you feel entitled to label other people for not agreeing w you. like, what?

That's an incredibly weird thing to say.

For one thing, being trans-gender doesn't mean you have an obligation to treat other people a certain way. It just means being trans-gender.

Wanting to police the behaviour of trans-gender people before you decide what 'label' you'll let them wear is discriminatory as fuck. Even calling it 'deciding what label you wear'...

So "TERF" means what? Trans-Exclusionary Rat Fucker? or is it something else?

Radical Feminist.

I guess I was off the mark there.

Taking what we've got to work with tho the trouble for me is I'm not sure people who call other people 'cis scum' are entirely serious, or if they are serious that they're a serious threat, and not sure if they haven't got some good intentions in there somewhere. As opposed to someone who would say 'trans scum'. i.e. Are people who call you 'cis scum' really significant enough to use as reference points in building your political outlook?

― Never changed username before (cardamon)

way to marginalize and appropriate the voices of the radical trans community, cis scum

I'm not sure people who call other people 'cis scum' are entirely serious, or if they are serious that they're a serious threat, and not sure if they haven't got some good intentions in there somewhere.

"i'm sure X isn't serious and has good intentions deep down" seems like a non confrontational way to excuse shit behavior

Well I mean I wasn't sure they had good intentions.

It's just I dunno, my picture of the whole thing is that while no doubt there are trans people who engage in shitty behaviour they are verrry much more sinned against than sinning. Like I don't think there are many trans people who assault cis people on sight, right?

oh good this thread is about terf shit now, welp

It's just I dunno, my picture of the whole thing is that while no doubt there are trans people who engage in shitty behaviour they are verrry much more sinned against than sinning. Like I don't think there are many trans people who assault cis people on sight, right?

― Never changed username before (cardamon), Thursday, June 8, 2017 8:09 AM (twenty-nine seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

as a genderqueer person i try to keep up my monthly quota

(this is a ridiculous conversation)

Big part of the ridiculousness being my failure to think on about how there might be trans people who post on ilx and talk 'about' rather than 'to' and who this stuff might affect in a way it doesn't affect me. Sorry.

lol i didn't mean to single you out specifically cardamon, you're fine

https://www.autostraddle.com/in-conversation-with-sarah-schulman-theyre-being-taught-that-control-is-freedom-376920/?all=1

Conflict Is Not Abuse [: Overstating Harm, Community Responsibility, and the Duty of Repair ] is a discussion of how inflated accusations of harm are used to avoid accountability, and she traces this phenomenon as it applies from interpersonal relationships to global politics. For the latter, she looks specifically at HIV criminalization in Canada and the occupation of Palestine. The book opens with the example of the police officers who saw Michael Brown and Eric Garner as “threatening” when they were doing literally nothing, and how any kind of difference, resistance or anxiety can be seen as an attack when it’s not. The book has generated heaps of conversation online and off, is blurbed by bell hooks and Claudia Rankine, is the winner of the Judy Grahn Award for Lesbian Non-Fiction and a nominee for a Lambda Literary Award.

Of course, it was the interpersonal and local community focused sections at the front that really drew me in, because I am basic like that. Her investigation of shunning and group dynamics, especially within groups heavily populated by those who’ve experienced personal trauma or inherited generational trauma, is particularly interesting from the perspective of a queer community organizer.

long interview w/ the author

For the latter, she looks specifically at HIV criminalization in Canada and the occupation of Palestine.

What, like, the hidden link between or

item a, item b

Slightly disappointed but happy to acknowledge that this is no fair lens through which the work itself ought to be viewed

they are verrry much more sinned against than sinning

TBH, Chelsea (née Charlie) has sinned against every well-meaning Facebook friend since going on the estradiol.

https://m.chicagoreader.com/chicago/michael-bonesteel-resignation-saic-henry-darger-comics/Content?oid=27428790

According to Bonesteel, the first incident occurred on December 12 in his course the Present and Future of Outsider Art. During discussion of a theory that connects the most striking feature of Darger's work—the prevalence in it of little girls with penises—with possible childhood sexual abuse, a transgender student objected.

"The student said there was no proof that Darger was sexually abused, and therefore I was wrong in proposing the theory," Bonesteel says, adding that he agreed that there was no proof, but said many scholars thought it likely.

old-timer mistake, any 'childhood abuse' explanations are a big red flag

Child abuse is a major theme in Darger's work, if not the major theme. A personal history of abuse might not explain the anatomy of his figures but it still seems likely.

http://peterlevine.ws/?p=18714

on our old friend, microaggressions. it's been so long!

http://peterlevine.ws/?p=18714🕸

on our old friend, microaggressions. it's been so long!

That was fun to read and I learned some stuff!

Also this sentence was in it

Jürgen Habermas laments the tendency to “juridify” or “judicialize” what he calls the “Lifeworld.”

Campus administrators are judicializing the Lifeworld and only you can stop them

http://www.thedailybeast.com/protesters-demand-emmett-till-artist-dana-schutz-be-banned-in-boston

Wow all these people are completely up their own ass

Respini noted that these subjects are “bigger than one artist or one painting—I would say they are the biggest topics of our times.”

No, that would be our continued survival on earth and the future of democracy

Today, some of us follow up with you. We recognize that you took notes; but we want to ensure that you are clear on the essential points that we shared with you on July 20.

http://www.vulture.com/2017/08/the-toxic-drama-of-ya-twitter.html

I just read that, all the outrage (over things that not only have people not read but are insisting no one else should ever read either) is so exhausting. I'd like to think the guy who says this is an ugly but necessary cultural phase is right, and that we'll eventually move to some more reasonable phase, but who knows.

Curious about the "necessary" part.

This is the part I meant:

Another agent, who describes himself as devoted to diversity in publishing since before it became a mainstream concern, is ambivalent about the current state of affairs.

“I think we’re in a really ugly part of the process,” he says. “But as we’re trying to encourage a greater diversity of readers and writers, we need to be held accountable for our mistakes. Those books do need to get criticized, so that books which are written more mindfully, respectfully, and diligently become the norm.”

As history has proved, when you criticize books people stop writing bad ones.

if POC YA authors are underrepresented then that is a problem worth addressing, but if the worst thing you can say about a novel written by a white person is that it propagates the white-savior narrative then just call the thing trash and move on. Like, that movie The Help was some bullshit but I don't remember anyone saying it shouldn't even be allowed to exist.

That was 6 years ago, tho -- the outrage cycle has sped up a lot since then. But probably big-budget Hollywood vehicles are less likely to be destabilized. And even all of the stuff in this article apparently hasn't hurt the book in sales or reviews. YA authors are just much softer targets than Hollywood producers.

so just from that article it sounds like the book is actually anti-racism and the critical review took excerpts out of context where racist characters were sharing their opinions - something the book challenges. it's not just a free speech issue here - it's also an idiot reader issue.

some people still have a problem, amazingly, distinguishing representation from endorsement.

some of the tweets linked to in that article refer to 'sensitivity readers', which is a term I'd never heard of before, but there seem to have been a flurry of articles about them earlier this year:

These advising angels—part fact-checkers, part cultural ambassadors—are new additions to the book publishing ecosystem. Either hired by individual authors or by publishing houses, sensitivity readers are members of a minority group tasked specifically with examining manuscripts for hurtful, inaccurate, or inappropriate depictions of that group.

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2017/02/how_sensitivity_readers_from_minority_groups_are_changing_the_book_publishing.html

the index of sensitivity readers on that 'Writing in the Margins' website the Slate article mentions makes it look like this is almost exclusively a YA thing, idk if sensitivity readers exist in any other genre of literature in this formalised way?

I think the main takeaway for me, after skimming that "review," is that it doesn't really make the case for their stance despite the fact it's nine thousand words and spends way too much time explaining the entire set-up for the book without actually addressing how it fails. The excerpts don't really bear out the point, in that they read as bad people saying things that are undeniably bad.

Maybe the blogger is a trusted opinion in the circles they trade in, but I don't think I'd come away from that overview with a strong opinion either way. I think the backlash to the Vulture article I've seen misses the point that no one really comes out on top in this situation. There's no endorsement of the book, there's no one saying that the criticism is unnecessary, there's just the recognition this churn of criticism based on a single point of reference is not helping.

I mean, if several people previewing the book had come out with the same conclusion, it'd make sense. But as far as I can tell, one person saw the book, and a million comments were born

That's the thing, to me -- a single, rambling blog post doesn't deserve a concerted effort to blackball a writer. On the other hand, writing a rant like that doesn't mean the reviewer needs to be pilloried, either. That was their take, and it's not their fault other people ran with it, although I'd bet someone is crafting a takedown of the reviewer to keep the churn running

Probably not. They kind of make sense for YA honestly. Kids are impressionable and YA is in theory somewhat educative so representation matters more.

It's good to consider all of this stuff, discuss, critique, etc. But I can't help but be disturbed by these social media public shaming spectacles, where people are raked through the coals for -- at best, in this case -- accidental transgressions like rehashing a kind of white savior dynamic in a book about elves.

Sorry xp soref

I just keep thinking about things like that horrifying series about Pearls that got shitcanned almost immediately after it was announced and comparing that horrifying thing to this and sighing about the premature death of nuance.

the index of sensitivity readers on that 'Writing in the Margins' website the Slate article mentions makes it look like this is almost exclusively a YA thing, idk if sensitivity readers exist in any other genre of literature in this formalised way?

I'd figure YA is the only part of publishing that makes enough money to be able to hire anyone to do anything

Lol

tbf I'd be all about a really obvious book where people say things that are very racist and sexist, in language that mirrors the dumb things people actually say, and those characters are portrayed as racist and sexist

kids need that kind of thing so they have a reference guide for when adults say things in real life. "ah yes, this is exactly like what Professor Jerkass said about dragons, and he was being a complete racist! I bet my uncle's a racist and what he's saying is wrong"