privilege as a meme

and the corollary idea that that guy is not really "privileged" because look at what a loser he is

xp ok, i have not been saying that i am not privileged or anything like that and i am definitely not defending those people featured in the tumblr. it's possible, though, that i am (due to privilege) underestimating the necessity of public mockery and censure as a tactic because i find it distasteful.

yeah, I'm aware of the trope. thanks for the context. this thread has gotten dizzying.

http://s3.amazonaws.com/auteurs_production/images/film/revenge-of-the-nerds/w448/revenge-of-the-nerds.jpg

like, i don't want to understate how ugly and hateful their attitudes are. it's just that i wish the force of the tumblr was somehow able to more geared toward the ugly theses nerds' ideas are and not, you know, the nerds themselves.

Again, WHY are you identifying them all as nerds? Iirc there were many different types of men and boys, SOME OF THEM OBJECTIVELY QUITE GOOD LOOKING. I think the nerd similarity is your own lens here.

maybe, from what i could gather (looking briefly at the tumblr, but also mostly at the images included in the banner image of the jezebel article) the "nice guys" featured were sort of inept and lame. i mean, you would have to be to include bitter misogynist remarks in a dating profile.

this thread has gotten so weird!

i'm not in favor of bullying but tbh i don't feel a bit sorry for those guys. pretty much every woman i know who's ever had an okc profile has gotten barraged with creepy and demeaning and outright hateful messages from random strangers on a regular basis. if stuff like this discourages that behavior, more power to tumblr imo.

also, mordy + in orbit generally otm

And also again (and again, and again), singling out a category that for whatever reasons is meaningful to you and saying the whole exercise of identifying and breaking down invisible-knapsack privilege is less useful or suspect in some way because that specific category is underrepresented in the diagnosis is BAD. STOP DOING THAT. It makes the speaker seem like a blindered twit who only wants to weasel some conception of themselves out of perceived blame.

from what i remember the vast majority (if not all) of the posts on nice guys of okc were guys with "ugly ideas" over the pictures. there are other ones that do a lot of shaming but for that one the point seemed to be mostly abt highlighting the hypocrisy

i think i might be confusing this tumblr with "fedoras of okc" where the emphasis seemed to be on the pictures.

And if anyone else wants to whine that straight white men are really so much worse off than everyone who is not them thinks they are, I AM GOING TO KNIFE A BITCH TONIGHT. Shut it. I have a class at 7.30, someone else will have to take over holding this fort in my absence.

xp indeed, while there is some overlap between the fedoras & nice guys of okc, ppl are conflating them to strange effect itt

also -

"i can't speak for the us but ime in the uk i don't think i've ever worked with somebody who wasn't middle class, or came from a poor background"

this is crazy, for how many ppl is this true?

yeah, sorry, i think i definitely made that mistake. i am still uncomfortable with the idea of public shaming -- like, i wouldn't make a tumblr like that -- but i think, idk, pointing out people with sexist ideas is justified. i also want to add that i am not saying that straight white men are worse off than people say they are. that's not what i think. i think institutional privilege is weighted toward that category overwhelmingly and that dismantling the system that favors them is an important and urgent project.

I do have to take issue with this:

If some of them shared a quality of not being very highly placed in a patriarchal system

I don't really buy that hierarchies based on attractiveness, social ease, etc. are inherently "patriarchal"

otherwise agree with most of what you posted and hope i have not caused you to want to knife a bitch

"i can't speak for the us but ime in the uk i don't think i've ever worked with somebody who wasn't middle class, or came from a poor background"

That got away from me in the press but thank you for bringing it back: what LG said is completely bonkers to me. I know a signif number of ppl personally who grew up with welfare, food stamps, etc, who now are professionals, have advanced degrees, and are fully integrated into my work and social circles with everyone else. And I know there are more than a couple of ilxors who grew up poor and disadvantaged in multiple ways and yet are educated, media savvy, internet-using moderns just like everyone else. I do not recognize my own experience anywhere in his account.

public shaming can be good and can be bad. depends on who's doing it to whom, why and how, etc. for instance, i'm glad to see see bigots and bullies shamed down, but less glad to see the weak and ostracized ridiculed for being "weird". sometimes the twain meet, i suppose.

i also am kind of flabbergasted by the "never meet a poor" business. maybe america really does allow a lot more social mobility than the old world, i dunno.

it's ok guys ronan was public schooled

(he's gonna go fucking nuts when he reads that)

oi

xp to contenderizer. that is all i was saying. there was a resemblance b/w the nice guys tumblr (and to a greater extent, the fedoras tumblr, which was in the back of my mind) sort of bordered on conventional bullying. i still think the "nice guy" attitude/entitlement is a real problem, i guess i should have been clearer about that.

idk it can be tough to know you're talking/working with 'a poor person' but i do run into the odd one on the bus or street, tho obv i'd never approach the rough beast like

wtf is going on here

I want to back up this public shaming thing ("public shaming") because when a person HAS DONE A THING AND IS NOT SORRY, it is not necessarily "shaming" to just make it known that they did it and stand behind their actions. If that thing is fucking shameful then that is the consequence for them.

^xp

whenever LG talks abt poor ppl itt i imagine him thinking of like street urchins with newsy caps and typhus

Also, no one is obligated to be nice.

sure, but that argument can be made to undermine the problematization of 'privilege', or identity politics, etc, as well fwiw

would like to think that a concern for the underprivileged is not just about power dynamics, that there's maybe some level of compassion or belief in human worth in there as well. hard to ask for respect for your cause/position while also declaring your right to take pleasure in senseless dickishness (not suggesting anyone's innocent of this, don't get me wrong)

and on that note, not so sure about your defense of public ridicule/bullying - hardly that noble usually, and even when it is about 'enforcing norms', eh that's a pretty amoral and cruel process sometimes(and sometimes pretty conservative one), and hardly beyond criticism

sort of reminds me of the woody allen joke, "I'm a bigot, but for the left." but i guess from a tactical perspective, people who defend the blogs would say it is necessary to go through a cruel process of enforcing "new norms." as you can gather from my posts, i don't want to think that is necessary... i am a believer in civil discourse, and in treating everyone with dignity, even violent criminals or whatever... but i guess that is its own discussion.

xp i'll repeat what i said before: not everyone is concerned with gaining "respect for their cause", not everything a woman does is meant to reflect on "the feminism movement" on the whole, and angry catharsis can be a lifesaver

and ppl who have been systemically shat on and held down their whole lives are not obligated to have a belief in everyone's beautiful human worth, the right to anger is necessary

Going to self-defense class, sharpening knife. Behave.

and ppl who have been systemically shat on and held down their whole lives are not obligated to have a belief in everyone's beautiful human worth except nerds

- bob marley

irl lols

lol being bullied by the cool kids =/= systemic life long oppression! come on

YOU DON'T GET TO DECIDE THAT

bullying can be pretty traumatic.

but that doesn't make it an indicator of oppression

i think it is different than institutional oppression. i don't think it is worth debating whether it is more or less psychologically devastating... in most cases it probably isn't but in some cases it might be... but i think it is just a different kind of oppression, that operates differently, and has more localized consequences.

there's that sliding sale of privilege. i had a hard life so fuck you and yours. can't get behind this strategy, but hey agree to disagree

xp

(meant to put that "i had a hard life" sentence in quotations)

i'm sorry io

i have failed u

everyone has had a hard life. suffering is universal. no one "has it easy."

also, being underprivileged often makes you more likely to hold prejudiced, ignorant attitudes, not less. but that doesn't mean you aren't underprivileged, and derserving of compassion, like eveyrone is, in my view.

is that statement based on anything at all

i think it's important to keep individual experience separated from our sense of general demographic realities. the (in this case hypothetical) fact that a straight white male may have been oppressed in this or that situation doesn't take anything away from the general truth that straight white males as a group receive a great deal of unearned social privilege.

also, even if straight white males are in general highly privileged, these aren't the only privilege groups that exist. the able-bodied, the "attractive", those who haven't suffered abuse or other psychologically scarring trauma: these groups are also specially privileged.