• Jax@sh.itjust.works
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    11 months ago

    Do you think Lemmy has a sizeable userbase compared to other platforms? Because I don’t. It’s grown considerably, that does not make it large enough to be directly compared to something like Reddit, Xitter etc.

    My only comment to your next point is: why try to convince others that are morally aligned with you? Why waste your time talking to people who won’t disagree with you?

    I brought it up in the first place as a meta commentary on how threads like this are perceived on larger platforms. This is not the first time a debate like this has happened, it will not be the last. I was merely examining how something like a reductive statement can backfire unintentionally.

    For example, I agreed with everything the original commenter stated. Right up until they brought up how “white people suddenly know how to protest when yadayada”. This statement is what I’m talking about when I say “yt people bad or variants of”. Granted, with explanation the statement makes perfect sense. Without explanation, as is the inevitable conclusion of most reductive statements, sparked the talk about lurkers.

    am i correct in saying that the topic in question that you don’t like becoming racially charged when race is never the real problem with it is how teaching that social change is achieved by being reasonable is a form of whitewashed history

    You aren’t correct until you make this paragraph make sense. I’m not implying you should be reasonable with fascists.

    • gayhitler420@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      It’s a hard sentence to parse. I tried to write it a bunch of ways to avoid using “scare quotes” and that’s the best I could come up with.

      I’m asking if the topic of this thread, that the conception of social change as achievable through being reasonable is whitewashed history, is the topic around which conversations “always become racially charged despite that never being the real problem.”

      With that out of the way: how is

      My take home message is it turns out that when white people actually want something they magically know what effective forms of protest actually look like (???!)

      White people bad? I just can’t figure out how to get there.

      As to why I’d try to convince someone morally aligned with me, first of all I’m not sure that you are and second I’m not trying to convince you of anything, I’m asking you questions to try and understand your views. I was explaining before how it would have been fine if the top comment was “white people bad” even though it wasn’t.

      I don’t think lemmy is comparable in size to the big social media platforms. I do think that if what I said was as upsetting as you say, there would be a lot more downvotes on it. I don’t think lemmy has the same ideological makeup as the big social media platforms, but look at my response to your glib categorization of the top comment as “white people bad”: 7 to 1 versus your 3 to 7. Even accounting for wildly different ideology here, surely the sub-humans you described earlier are on lemmy in greater proportion than one in eight!

      • Jax@sh.itjust.works
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        11 months ago

        Ok, for one thing it’s more like a paragraph than a sentence. For another, I’m not saying you should be reasonable with the people in power. I’m saying you should be reasonable with the idiots who outnumber you. Because yes, the average American reads at about the 6th to 8th grade level (looked it up to verify after the other response, was a little off). If you genuinely believe that a person who reads at that low of a level looks beyond surface level, I don’t know what to tell you other than you are optimistic verging on naive.

        My take home message is it turns out that when white people actually want something they magically know what effective forms of protest actually look like (???!)

        Tell me why being white is relevant after the rest of their message when white people aren’t the only ones that are anti-abortion? Tell me exactly why.

        Ah yes, big number better than small number. You sure did get me, wow.

        • gayhitler420@lemm.ee
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          11 months ago

          Reading level based on school grades has everything to do with a persons vocabulary and ability to parse complex passages. It is not an indicator of a persons ability to understand complex ideas or think deeply.

          Being white is relevant because the top poster is talking about

          all the times anti-abortion activists either successfully murdered or attempted to murder their political opponents in the name of the pro life movement.

          Those people are overwhelmingly white. The top poster isn’t talking about people who line up on one side or another, but people who take direct violent action. When it comes to anti-abortion activists those people are white.

          The top poster isn’t saying that white people are bad, they’re saying white people know that direct action works and are allowed to use it. That is descriptive of a trait that the racist settler colonial state has, not some hive mind all the white people tap into and use to coordinate their actions to avoid repercussions.

          I’m not sure what you’re talking about when you say you don’t think we should be reasonable with the people in power, I asked if the topic of this thread, that the conception of social change as achievable through being reasonable is whitewashed history, is the topic around which conversations “always become racially charged despite that never being the real problem.”

          I didn’t reference a bunch of Reddit crap to “get” you. I brought it up because it represents a real life measurement that ought to bear out your thesis that people can’t stand what I say but it doesn’t seem to.

          • Jax@sh.itjust.works
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            11 months ago

            Reading level has everything to do with critical thinking. The fact that you’ve even tried to suggest otherwise completely proves that I’ve been wrong in trying to converse with you.

            I finally understand what you’ve been trying to ask.

            Is the idea that " ‘change can be achieved through being reasonable’ is whitewashed history" the topic around which conversations ‘always become racially charged despite that never being the real problem’.

            Just so we’re clear, there are more ways to use quotes than scare quotes. No, the answer is no. People are primed to hate these days, it doesn’t really matter if you’re white skinned or otherwise.

            And, if you read what I fucking wrote for the 15th time I actually did answer you. Very clearly. Being reasonable with the people in power is not how change is achieved. Violence is, and the whole god damn point of what I’ve said is that violence is a pretty bad fucking solution for all of us when it’s pointed at the wrong people. Especially at such a critical juncture of human history.

            I’m not engaging with you further on this. My advice to you is stop skimming when you read.

            • gayhitler420@lemm.ee
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              11 months ago

              I can think critically just fine despite not having literacy in hundreds of languages. If literacy were correlated to critical thinking skills the person with the most languages under their belt would be the best critical thinker.

              So if the topic of the thread isn’t the thing that becomes racially charged, what is?

              • Jax@sh.itjust.works
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                11 months ago

                Yes, in fact, learning more languages is correlated to stronger critical thinking.

                By the way, are you English as a second language? I’m curious because many of the things you’re “misunderstanding” actually seem like language barrier issues.

                To your last question, as it turns out, I can’t decipher what the fuck you’re trying to say. It is nonsense. I’ve tried to translate it for you, but then I answer and suddenly your question shapeshifts and seems completely unrelated to what I thought you asked.

                Debatelord nonsense. Waste of my time.

                • gayhitler420@lemm.ee
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                  11 months ago

                  You said you finally understood what I was asking a reply or so back. It was in reference to my question about what becomes racially charged. I asked using a simple yes or no format and you said no, but now I’m asking in a more open ended way: What is the topic that “always become(s) racially charged despite that never being the real problem”?

                  • Jax@sh.itjust.works
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                    11 months ago

                    Yes, I assumed I understood what you were trying to say. Unfortunately the logic of what you’re asking shifts the same way the direction of your goalposts do. And I’m certain it’s because you haven’t taken the time to read what I’ve said.

                    There is no specific topic. Racially charged topics are, and they always have been, a waste of fucking time. The second we moved past phrenology should have been the end of this notion that physical traits determines societal value. It doesn’t matter what your perspective is, race is a made up concept that shouldn’t define who you are.

                    It doesn’t matter if you think you’re proud as fuck to be white under the umbrella of “whiteness” or proud as fuck of being black under the umbrella of “blackness” or whatever other words you arbitrarily assign to this issue. If that pride leads to innocent people being hurt, you are always wrong.