On Topic Discussion What do you think about bisexuals?

[bankside]

People are stilling aiming to end discrimination you moron! But how can you end something, if you don't bloody say what it is!!!! That is all the whole privilege thing is doing - it's step one on the path! There are loads more to go, and we are making them every day.


P.S I am sorry that my responses came out in different things. At first I was only going to respond to one point, but..... Anyway I can't be arsed to clean it up

We already figured out decades before any academic said the word "privilege" that people faced discrimination and were not getting all the things they were entitled to living in a free society. Why do you think we need this word then, or the concepts behind it? What does it bring to the discussion that was lacking?

 

[bankside]

The whole point of this whole thing is that minorities lead their own liberation - everyone else is just an ally. She was not saying that she would not stand up for gay rights, just that she would not be the face of gay rights. That is for gay men to do - not women. They should just support. In the same way I never call myself a feminist - just an ally.

In some cases it is perfectly acceptable for someone else to talk about issues - like if I am with a group of guys and I stand up for feminism. But if I am with someone from a minority, and they are talking about their issues - I am not going to talk over them, I am not going to try and talk for them. I am going to sit back, listen and learn. That is all you can do.

I believe, in the tradition of classical liberalism, that ideas trump identity. I disagree with your approach, and I don't think what you say will provide meaningful change to the way society works. Anyone can speak up for equality. That principle actually embodies the principle of equality within it. I don't believe minorities lead their own liberation. I believe egalitarians lead any kind of liberation, whether they are from a minority or a majority.

 

[xbuzzerx]

That would make privilege theory both mistaken in theory and useless in practice.

A generation ago, people planned to actually end discrimination. "Highlighting" something while doing exactly nothing about it seems to lack ambition.

You are so dense. The Civil Rights movement was about ending DE JURE inequality, written into laws.

Privilege largely refers to DE FACTO inequality, in people's practices, attitudes, and the implemention of laws.

You can't begin to deal with the latter until you actually reach the point of establishing that differential experiences exist for two different groups of people operating under exactly the same laws which may, in and of themselves, not be inherently racist laws. Such as Jon Stewart pointing out that in Ferguson 92% of the police force is white, 60 some % of the population is black, and nearly 90% of the stops and tickets and citations go to black residents. No racist law standing on the books is dictating this to be the case.

So welcome back to round 2 of "Bankside willfully unable of comprehending the actual word and its actual meaning."

 

[JohnnyAnger]

We already figured out decades before any academic said the word "privilege" that people faced discrimination and were not getting all the things they were entitled to living in a free society. Why do you think we need this word then, or the concepts behind it? What does it bring to the discussion that was lacking?

You have blown privilege up to be the biggest thing in the world - its a small part of the movement that involves reminding people of their position.

Is your problem with this that you won't acknowledge that you had advantages in life due to your birth, rather than your merit?

 

[xbuzzerx]

In some cases it is perfectly acceptable for someone else to talk about issues - like if I am with a group of guys and I stand up for feminism. But if I am with someone from a minority, and they are talking about their issues - I am not going to talk over them, I am not going to try and talk for them. I am going to sit back, listen and learn. That is all you can do.

You'd make a poor Bankside.

 

[xbuzzerx]

We already figured out decades before any academic said the word "privilege" that people faced discrimination and were not getting all the things they were entitled to living in a free society. Why do you think we need this word then, or the concepts behind it? What does it bring to the discussion that was lacking?

So according to you no racial inequality exists in any case other than being able to firmly establish that written laws themselves are inherently racist.

Racism in practice, application, implementation of widespread policies that are carried out by individuals with individual prejudices, or within a system that does not recognize its own prejudiced implementation, whether it's bank loans to homebuyers of certain ethnicities or police targetting of some groups much more harshly and forcefully than others, does not exist.

Exactly how far do you want to go with showing how much you simply refuse to get it?

Privilege is the fact that you do not walk away from a bank suspecting you might have been turned down because of your race, and then going online and finding out that 30% more people of your race from the same income bracket get turned down than another race. You don't even consider it. Not having to consider it is something you consider normal.

It's not normal to anyone who isn't white.

And I'm definitely repeating things I said in the other thread because you're still posting the same crap attempting to rewrite the meaning or implication of the term into something you can attack or declare wrong just because you're so clearly hellbent on refusing to acknowledge that these inequalities continue, and that they work against others and not against you.

 

[xbuzzerx]

You have blown privilege up to be the biggest thing in the world - its a small part of the movement that involves reminding people of their position.

Is your problem with this that you won't acknowledge that you had advantages in life due to your birth, rather than your merit?

Privilege is essential in the ability to answer anyone who is critical either of racial equality or of even LGBT equality who might say "Why do you deserve those SPECIAL rights?"

Whether or not Bankside would wriggle in discomfort at accepting the label of a privilege discussion, that's exactly what's involved in answering someone who says that regarding minorities or LGBT seeking equality in society. People regard equality for minorities or LGBT to be some kind of "special rights" precisely because, as the privilege concept describes, people in a position of privilege are usually blind to that privilege and do not conceive of it as an advantage they enjoy and others do not.

 

[Rolyo85]

It always weirds me out when people try to deny the existence of racial bias outside of laws... Like, wut?

 

[Kulindahr]

Privilege is essential in the ability to answer anyone who is critical either of racial equality or of even LGBT equality who might say "Why do you deserve those SPECIAL rights?"

I first encountered the term "privilege" used in this social sense in a discussion of the Sepoy Rebellion. I think it was a useful term in that discussion, and I don't think it's lost its validity: it points to an actual dissonance in a society, where some take for granted their position ad others are kept in deprivation because of that failure to perceive that anything is wrong.

 

[MakeDigitalLove]

Simply that racism fucks over life for many people in society without actually making life better for anyone at all.

If I drive down a street minding my business on my merry way with no problem, and then you do the same 10 minutes later and get stopped by a racist cop, you're inconvenienced, treated with a lack of dignity to which you're entitled, denied the benefit of the law to equal presumption of innocence, and possibly put at risk to your safety depending on how unhinged the cop is, but none of that makes my day any better as a white guy. All it did was waste both of our tax dollars to keep this idiot cop on the streets.

Really? I mean.. really?

 

[xbuzzerx]

Really? I mean.. really?

That's basically his way of exonerating white people (and presumably himself) of any responsibility of consciousness or awareness about racial inequality: You cannot say "white people enjoy an advantage in a racist society." You can only say "non-white people experience a disadvantage (that is not NORMAL.)"

Of course the hole in his reasoning is that if you are not allowed to draw any attention to the difference between how a privileged group and non-privileged group (even if that 'privilege' = full and unharassed recognition of full rights as equal citizens) are treated in an unequal society, then we're looking at zero sum and anything we do to address inequality is some kind of unnecessary "special treatment/right."

 

[MoufOfKhaos]

Let's go ahead and add cut/uncut and "shaving makes you look like a boy" to this discussion.

 

[palbert]

Let's go ahead and add cut/uncut and "shaving makes you look like a boy" to this discussion.

I thought Kuli's erudite mention of the Sepoy Rebellion was nicely sapiosexualist too.

 

[MoufOfKhaos]

I thought Kuli's erudite mention of the Sepoy Rebellion was nicely sapiosexualist too.

I only had an English major for a year and a half - you're gonna have to dumb that down for me.

 

[palbert]

Can we all just stop thinking about bisexuals now.

Hear! Hear!

 

[MoufOfKhaos]

As soon as we stop thinking of them as less than what they are, yes. Until there are less sokkers' and cgymikes here and more people capable of thinking outside of themselves, you can deal or you can flee.

 

[Gentleheart]

Let's go ahead and add cut/uncut and "shaving makes you look like a boy" to this discussion.

You start.

I only had an English major for a year and a half - you're gonna have to dumb that down for me.

He's trying to passive aggressively throw shade. And he's NOT ready.

sapiosexual: people who find intelligence sexually attractive

 

[Rolyo85]

Can we all just stop thinking about bisexuals now.

They don't like that...

 

[mikey3000]

Yes, we are amused by all this attention.

 

[Jersey Domino]

Well I have no Problem with Bisexuals and I don't think less of them in any way. I also have no Qualms about dating one.