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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   30412 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 21, 2022

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Some rambling on modern attitudes found generally leftward which I strongly dislike. First, an anecdote:

There was recently a shooting at a gay bar. I share an online space with some friends and some acquaintances for general purpose discussion - no specific focus other than a general lean toward our mutual shared interests, which are unrelated to the shooting or what follows.

One person posted an article about the shooting and then something roughly equivalent to "thoughts and prayers" for the victims, and a follow up note that Bigotry Is Bad. No problem, I'm on board. A second person posted that, as a sexual minority, they are now afraid to go out. They have updated based on this attack to think the world is not safe enough to enjoy. I interjected with something along the lines of "hold on, attacks like this are less likely to get you than car accidents or [insert whatever mundane thing] - yes they're flashy and scary, but you really shouldn't update based on them - they're statistically insignificant AND if you want to view them as terrorism then you living in fear is letting them win - you shouldn't do that"

The response I got was a gentle dogpile (they did start with "I know you're just trying to help, but..." and such), saying that I shouldn't be trying to tell marginalized people how to feel about things and I should let them have space to process their trauma and etc etc, much insistence on "letting the victims speak" (by which they mean indirect victims - people that share a class with the victims, not the firsthand victims) and being a good ally by listening. I pushed back for a bit saying that I'm not making any claims about the general safety of LGBTetc folks (though they are still safe enough to not feel so afraid of the world around them if they live somewhere like the US, this was left unsaid) and that I'm only saying if you previously had the courage to face the world, the shooting shouldn't have changed that and we explicitly had a person saying exactly that they were now afraid based on this event...

But eventually I got the sense they just didn't want to hear me. I gave an apology in the vein of "when people are afraid is exactly the BEST time to reassure them, but clearly I am failing to do that, so I'll back off" and they spent a few seconds talking about how important and good it is to let LGBT voices speak first (of which there were several available in the space, many of which were in the dopile). After those seconds, we have had 24+ hours of silence. Not a word on the topic from any involved or even any spectators, though they all continued talking about unrelated things in other channels of the space.

So. What happened here? I feel like insistence on sitting down and letting marginalized voices be heard is frequently insincere, as it happens even when nobody marginalized (or indeed, anybody at all) has anything to say. It is a "shut up" button, to be deployed whenever somebody says something you don't like that's adjacent to [minority issue]. Even if that isn't how they feel about it, that is functionally what is going on.

Superweapons are bad.

So I'm getting an awful lot of responses in the vein of "of course they reacted like that, you responded with [logic] to [emotion] and that's no good" - ordinarily I would agree - case closed. I do get that, even if in this case I may have slipped a bit in practice. I'm generic nerd STEMy, not a complete sperg. That isn't the source of my confusion or the reason to bring it up. That's ordinary human dynamics 101 - and also not the reason I code the reaction as left.

I am confused by/reacting to/coding-as-left the specific reaction of "stop talking and let the marginalized speak" because in this case it demonstrably did not apply. Nobody marginalized spoke before or after about how they felt or what they thought aside from the literally singular sentence that maps to "I don't want to go out anymore because of fear of this" person.

THAT is what I code as left and am confused about. The idea of lived experience is not without merit. Some people have access to experiences others don't. But that's not the same as "always cede the floor, even if they aren't using it".

You are approaching this with a mistake theory mindset instead of with a conflict one. As you surmised their "stop talking and let the marginalized speak" was lefty speak for shut up, why did they do that? because you got between a bunch of lefties and the opportunity to affirm their "victimhood" to the audience and receive their backpats for their incredible bravery in existing. That is all it was, a self-masturbatory session, and you went and ruined it; with the added point that you are now probably in one or more shit lists in your group.

EDIT.- To further clarify: they used the "superweapon" because instead of acting like an ingroup member and praising the "victim" for his bravery and lamenting with the group the continued existance of white supremacy, you acted like a member of their outgroup and tried in their eyes to diminish the victimhood of one of their members.

I kind of did this once in response to a Facebook post. An acquaintance of mine posted that he wanted to make sure that he never made women feel unsafe as they walked alone on the street. He's a mildly effeminate super skinny gay vegan, the risk of this ever happening was already close to zero.

At the time I'd recently read some metrics on stranger victimization, and that men were overwhelmingly more likely to be murdered or assaulted by strangers. Women were more likely to be raped, but I think those numbers were still dwarfed by how lopsided the murder/assault numbers were.

I cited the stats and argued that we're miscalibrated. Either men aren't scared enough or women are too scared, but given the facts men ought to be more wary of strangers than women.

I think at least one person blocked me, and another berated me endlessly. I was pretty naive about how this would be taken at that time.

While their response was maybe dressed up in very annoying language, and I agree that there's no reason to be especially afraid of hate mass shootings compared to other more mundane risks, I think your response was a bit tone deaf.

hold on, attacks like this are less likely to get you than car accidents or [insert whatever mundane thing] - yes they're flashy and scary, but you really shouldn't update based on them - they're statistically insignificant AND if you want to view them as terrorism then you living in fear is letting them win - you shouldn't do that"

This comes off as slightly, dare I say, smug, even though I'm sure you weren't intending to come across that way. It's a fine point to make, but a more conciliatory tone would have gone along way. Something along the lines of, 'it's certainly discouraging that attacks like these are happening more often, but you should be reassured by the fact that the vast majority of the public is broadly tolerant...' would, I reckon, not have elicited the same response. Just a question of tone and manners really.

This comes off as slightly, dare I say, smug, even though I'm sure you weren't intending to come across that way.

Maybe, but back when Islamic terror attacks were a thing, this used to be a common left wing argument. Would you say we were acting smug back then?

I might well do, depending on the way you phrased your statements. But I should stress I don't have that much wrong with what he said; just a slight change in tone would have made it better received was all I was saying, and I'd say the same in the case of terrorism.

What happened here?

Me being a cynical bitch, you harshed their mellow. Here they were, all ready to bask in the rush of assurance, attention and online 'hugs and love' that would result from them posting about being gay and claiming to be too scared to go out, because here is evidence the heteronormative society of bigoted straights around you is out to get you, and then you come along with logic and reason and ruin it all.

Tsk, tsk!

Some people are just attention [sex workers] and will jump on any chance to go "But what about me???". Some people really are that neurotic and fearful that they sleep on the floor because if they had a bed, then that would give the monsters someplace to lurk under.

These kind of post-disaster chains aren't about "so what are my chances of being eaten by an octopus older than the universe, in reality?" They're about on the one hand "I am a Good Ally and extend unconditional love and accept the official version of events" and on the other "I am a special snowflake and I demand your attention".

They’re also about ‘I have a phobia and demand accommodation’.

This guy almost certainly knew that his fear was about as rational as being afraid of entering a skyscraper after 9/11. Pointing that out isn’t welcome, because it doesn’t change his reason for having this fear(which is likely to demand accommodation).

I think this is reading a lot into a comment of which you have only read a (not entirely sympathetic) precis. Seems most likely to me he was just engaging in the sort of hyperbole we all do on a daily basis.

Within the context of the discussion group, the person stating that they now felt less safe was essentially reinforcing the point that Bigotry Is Bad: "this bad thing is so bad that I feel less safe, which shows just how bad the bad thing is!". Your perfectly reasonable and true objection against their unwarranted update is then seen as an enemy argument. In an indirect way, you're arguing that the mass shooting wasn't literally the worst thing in the world, which is perceived as an attack on the in-group. There's also the female vs male styles of communication here, the person who wrote that they felt less safe was really communicating an emotion, whether or not their statement was actually true was much less important than what emotions it communicated, and the name of the game in emotional discussion is validation, you need to either make them feel heard, or respond at a similar emotional level. When your girlfriend says that she feels fat, you don't pull out data from your bluetooth scale that shows that she didn't actually get fat, you go kiss her and tell her that she's never been more attractive to you and that, in fact, you can barely restrain yourself from just taking her right now. Your fundamental faux-pas was that you responded factually to an emotional statement.

This more “female” style of communication is strongly associated with progressivism and has become increasingly dominant in a lot of online spaces and workplaces. I also find it typically eye-roll inducing and unproductive for any purposes beyond mutual emotional masturbation.

I, by contrast, often find that men who sneer at "I feel..." statements and "So what I hear you saying..." acknowledgements are often the first to appreciate genuine listening to their actual feelings, and validation of their emotions as socially understandable. Respecting other people's feelings is an important bit of social glue.

Indeed, in contexts like The Motte, thinking about people's underlying emotions rather than taking their statements solely at face value is a valuable part of my skill set. Often, acknowledging people's feelings can actually be a really useful aid to getting them to step away from their statements and examine them factually without feeling like those underlying emotions themselves are about to be crushed underfoot.

I do not doubt that emotionally respectful conversation can be done badly. I do not doubt that it can be enforced in unproductive ways. But if you think that enforcement of detached manly emotionlessness is the solution then you are very wrong.

The problem to me is that, as much as it claims the opposite, the feminine style of communication seems to be just as often about weaponizing emotions as is it about validly acknowledging them (which I don't think men actually have that much of a problem with).

Yeah, the point is well taken. I agree that there are clear contexts in which focalising empathetic norms in communication is helpful and serves as a social glue, as you say. The cases where that’s clearest to me, though, are ones involving genuinely close and mutually supportive relationships. What I do think is a bit pathological is when these same norms — helpful in intimate contexts — are translated to domains like Twitter or other kinds of social media where most people only have parasocial or pseudo-social relationships with each other. I largely approve of (literal or figurative) hugs, but dislike hugboxes.

Partly that’s because the forms of reassurance you get in online hugboxes are pretty unhelpful psychologically, insofar as they don’t come from someone who actually knows you and cares about you and is in a position to meaningfully validate you, but simply someone with your same political or identity-group values who’s been socialised to praise expressions of pain or victimhood or oppression that are framed in the right political vocabulary. These spaces typically strongly limit actual debate, and what debate actually does occur is often a form of “gotcha” based around identifying when someone is showing insufficient demonstration of compassion (e.g., “doesn’t your analysis marginalise the experiences of group X?”).

I genuinely think this kind of norm is corroding public online debate, but more to the point, I find it often intellectually insipid and emotionally ersatz. But that’s just online with relative strangers — in the real world (or in online communication with close friends or family) there’s obviously a space for primarily therapeutic rather than investigative or forensic communication.

do you have any evidence for these assertions or are you using the female style of communication right now?

Touché! I don’t have useful evidence at hand — it was a grumpy sideswipe, on anecdotal and observational grounds. If I were to make more a extended argument, I’d start by operationalising the specific communication style I have in mind, probably in terms of Trait Agreeableness (Compassion), which is robustly higher in women and higher in progressives, and then look for (or run) a sentiment analysis on left wing vs right wing social media spaces.

Like others, I don't understand why you think of this as "generally leftward." If anything, an inflated fear of being the victim of crime (esp after a publicized incident) despite its statistical unlikelihood tends to be right-coded. See, eg, the occasional comments on here re NYC in general or the NYC subway in particular.

Well, part of it is that attitudes about certain issues are what defines whether someone is conservative or liberal, including both attitudes toward criminal justice issues and diversity issues. For decades, and probably to some extent still, the statement, "liberals are soft on crime" has almost been a tautology (though, of course, liberals would not frame their attitudes in that way). If you opposed capital punishment or supported the rights of criminal defendants, historically you were, per se, a liberal (though of course there were a smattering of libertarians), which is why in 1984 future AG Meese was referring to the ACLU as "a criminals' lobby."

women's fear of rape/sexual assault

I would expect that, in fact, conservative women are more fearful of sexual assault than are liberal women, esp controlling for obvious confounders such as age, marital status, location, etc.

If anything, an inflated fear of being the victim of crime (esp after a publicized incident) despite its statistical unlikelihood tends to be right-coded.

I don't think so. It's endemic from women, for instance, who are less likely to be victims of overwhelmingly most types of crime.

I think you are mistaken. It has been right-coded for decades, and virtually every person I have met in my life who has expressed such sentiments has been conservative leaning. In fact, being overly concerned with crime is one of the attributes of conservatism -- hence, the old saying that a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged.

That isn't usually framed in terms of "oooh it makes me feel less safe" though -- safetyism is absolutely left and female coded. Additionally, only certain sorts of crime are worth consideration -- the aversion to talking about gang shootings and drug crime is notable.

Right wing concern about crime tends to be more of an "it's bad for society and symptomatic of a failing social contract" objection, by comparison. Less personal, most of the time, because conservatives by and large don't live in the (mostly left-controlled) cities where crime is most epidemic. So the specific personal safetyist concerns OP is talking about are absolutely leftist as far as I can tell.

The OP was writing about people who said, "because of this incident, I am afraid of being harmed if I do X." I am talking about the exact same thing: people who say, "I refuse to ride the subway" or "I refuse to go to neighborhood X" or what have you. I am not talking about policy discussions.

That isn’t usually framed in terms of “oooh it makes me feel less safe”

sure it is. how else would you even frame it? the impression i get from right-wingers who support “tough-on-crime” policies is that their desired outcome is to make things safer.

See, eg, the occasional comments on here re NYC in general or the NYC subway in particular

I've seen those. What I didn't see is an implication you're committing some kind of faux pas by disagreeing, particularly when you bring data. I also don't recall anyone expressing how important it is to have "white voices", or something, after someone expresses disagreement.

Otoh, if I say that Gender Queer might not be a threat to children, I run the risk of being accused of being a pedophile. And certainly ignoring data is not the province of any particular team; again, see lots of people on here.

Gender Queer

I had to look up what that was. And then read the Wikipedia article on it.

My opinion?

Eh, if you want twelve year olds to read about strap-ons and oral sex and older guy touching the dick of much younger guy, while I have no objection to Greek red figure pottery, the kids today can do what we did and look for anything about sex on our parents' bookshelves or elsewhere. Heck, they have the Internet today! They don't need to get it in school, are we meant to spoon-feed them everything?

And let's face it, while defending books from being banned might elicit passionate responses from school librarians, when it's "I stand up for the right of schools to ensure every twelve year old can find out about paederasty from the sexual fantasies, with illustrations, as recorded in her memoir by a non-binary woman", that can sound in the general ballpark of "groomer".

i think that “kids should learn about sex from the internet and whatever weird porn their parents have laying around the house” also sounds in the general ballpark of groomer for me

I think if you read the book, you might change your mind about what it is about. Note that a review committee in Fairfax County, VA composed of parents, teachers, and community members, recommended keeping the book and explicitly found that "The book neither depicts nor describes pedophilia." Similarly, committees in Rockwood MO, West Chester, PA, Billings. MT, and Yorktown, NY recommended keeping the book, and of course that is just a sampling -- google "keep gender queer" for recent examples.

That is not to say that IMHO the book should or should not be on school library shelves; I am sure that local parents, teachers, etc, know better than I what is best for local students, and many districts have decided to remove the book. But to infer that the book is an attempt at grooming is a very dubious inference.

Otoh, if I say that Gender Queer might not be a threat to children, I run the risk of being accused of being a pedophile.

a) A groomer, not a pedophile. I don't find the insistance on the most strict, and worst possible meaning of the word to be particularly honest, when progressives often use a broader definition of it themselves

b) Yes, the act of smearing someone with an insulting name is something both sides have in common. But that's not what he, or I was pointing out.

see lots of people on here

What's the point of these passive aggressive jabs? Especially since I didn't say people on the right don't ignore data, I said they don't think it's a faux pas to bring data.

a groomer, not a pedophile.

I agree with the OP here. Well, I agree that accusations of pedophilia are as likely as accusations of grooming, and in fact are strategically conflated. I don’t agree that it made sense for him to bring it up in this context, because...

they don’t think it’s a faux pas to bring data.

Yeah. It’s rare, here, to take offense at actually providing data. I’m not sure how well that holds in sections of the Internet which embrace the “fake news” meme.

A groomer, not a pedophile

  1. That is factually incorrect; if you look into it, you will find that the explicit term "pedophile" is used quite often.

  2. I don't want to get into this tiresome argument about how "groomer" is used, but the fact that "grooming" has several meanings, one positive or neutral ("the executive groomed his son to be his successor") and one negative (referring specifically to the tactics of pedophiles) does not mean that we can throw up our hands and pretend we can't know how particular people are using it. Moreover, the term "groomer" is really only used in two ways: 1) to refer to people who shape the fur of animals" and 2) pedophiles. Finally, if you are going to claim that progressives often use a broader definition of it themselves, you should probably not link to yourself.*

Yes, the act of smearing someone with an insulting name is something both sides have in common. But that's not what he, or I was pointing out.

Though not identical, I would say they are of the same class. Reasonable minds might differ, of course, but OTOH claims that "my out group is uniquely bad" are generally deserving of great skepticism, for obvious reasons.

What's the point of these passive aggressive jabs? Especially since I didn't say people on the right don't ignore data, I said they don't think it's a faux pas to bring data.

  1. You seem to be misusing the term, "passive-aggressive," since "Passive-aggressive behavior is a pattern of indirectly expressing negative feelings instead of openly addressing them"

  2. I am doubtful that the claim that that "think it is a faux pas to bring data" is true in any meaningful way; it is either false, or only true to the extent that it is indistinguishable from ignoring data. In my experience, most people of all political stripes get very upset when presented with data that upsets their hobby horses.

*Especially to a link which is not very honest; you say "It doesn't help that mainstream publications were using "grooming" to describe consensual relations between adults." and link to an article in which the only use of the term is: " “He started grooming me when I was a teenager"

Adding to what thrownaway24e89172 said, you're getting the same reaction to trying to define away all evidence of grooming because it sets off exactly the same alarm bells as "woah there, how dare you, she's 13 so technically it's not paedophilia." Definition dodging is a huge red flag.

It's just that some groups are used to the privilege of being able to change the dictionary to win, so being forced to use a less convenient definition feels like oppression.

I am not trying to "define away all evidence of grooming." I am clarifying the definition of grooming, which has been defined for decades as "a slow courtship or ’grooming’ process to seduce children with gifts,

attention and affection" employed by pedophiles for the purpose of convincing kids to have sex with them. It not "the left" or "LBBTQ activists" who are attempting to change the dictionary; it is people who are assigning that label to people, such as librarians, who as far as they know have no interest in convincing kids to have sex with anyone. Honestly, this place sometimes seems like the Bizarro world.

That is factually incorrect; if you look into it, you will find that the explicit term "pedophile" is used quite often.

I tried to look into it, while the word "pedophile" appears with some frequency, I don't see it in a context that would imply people who don't think "Gender Queer" is dangerous.

I don't want to get into this tiresome argument about how "groomer" is used, but the fact that "grooming" has several meanings, one positive or neutral ("the executive groomed his son to be his successor") and one negative (referring specifically to the tactics of pedophiles) does not mean that we can throw up our hands and pretend we can't know how particular people are using it. Moreover, the term "groomer" is really only used in two ways: 1) to refer to people who shape the fur of animals" and 2) pedophiles.

That's just not true. You would be correct, if there was only one negative meaning, which would specifically refer to pedophiles. The link I provided has a definition that does not specifically mention children, and another link to a mainstream media article using the word to describe consensual relations between adults.

Though not identical, I would say they are of the same class.

I might agree depending on what kind of class we're talking about. If you mean that these behaviors similarly bad, sure. If you mean these are similar behaviors in terms of their structure, or the psychology behind them, that seems obviously wrong, and we seem to be discussing the latter kind of class.

Reasonable minds might differ, of course, but OTOH claims that "my out group is uniquely bad" are generally deserving of great skepticism, for obvious reasons.

Sure? But I missed the part where OP said that...

You seem to be misusing the term, "passive-aggressive," since "Passive-aggressive behavior is a pattern of indirectly expressing negative feelings instead of openly addressing them"

Like vaguely gesturing at "lots of people on here" instead of addressing them directly?

I am doubtful that the claim that that "think it is a faux pas to bring data" is true in any meaningful way

The example brought up by OP seems to be clearly describing such a case.

*Especially to a link which is not very honest; you say "It doesn't help that mainstream publications were using "grooming" to describe consensual relations between adults." and link to an article in which the only use of the term is: " “He started grooming me when I was a teenager"

Is 18 not a teenager, and an adult?! Who is being dishonest here?

I don't see it in a context that would imply people who don't think "Gender Queer" is dangerous.

I have no idea what that means; I assume that there is some sort of typo.

But I missed the part where OP said that...

Then you need to read more carefully; that is exactly what this discussion is about.

Like vaguely gesturing at "lots of people on here" instead of addressing them directly?

  1. Again, you clearly do not understand what the term means.

  2. I am not talking about specific persons; I am talking about a general phenomenon. I note that you have not claimed that it does not exist, but instead have resorted to a silly ad hominem argument.

Is 18 not a teenager, and an adult?! Who is being dishonest here?

And your evidence that she was referring to his actions when she was over 18 is what, exactly?

I have no idea what that means; I assume that there is some sort of typo.

Possible grammar brainfart. You said that expressing the idea that "Gender Queer" is not dangerous would mark you as a pedophile. I don't see the word "pedophile" being used here, to describe people expressing that belief.

Then you need to read more carefully; that is exactly what this discussion is about.

Can you help me out? I see him discussing a specific type of behavior, which seems to be unique to the left. I don't see him saying the left is uniquely bad in general.

  1. Again, you clearly do not understand what the term means.
  1. I am not talking about specific persons; I am talking about a general phenomenon. I note that you have not claimed that it does not exist, but instead have resorted to a silly ad hominem argument.

These two points are contradictory. If I misunderstood you, believing that you had specific people in mind but are avoiding addressing them directly, then I understand the term, and used it correctly.

And your evidence that she was referring to his actions when she was over 18 is what, exactly?

You know what it is, because you read the article where this is clearly stated:

Wood, now 33 and a star of HBO’s Westworld, has said that she met shock-rocker Manson when she was 18 and he was 36.

More comments

Especially to a link which is not very honest; you say "It doesn't help that mainstream publications were using "grooming" to describe consensual relations between adults." and link to an article in which the only use of the term is: " “He started grooming me when I was a teenager"

If you are going to moan about improper usage of the term groomer, I think it behooves you to use other terms properly as well. Pedophilia refers to attraction to prepubescent children, which mostly excludes teenagers since it is very rare for a teenager to have not yet started puberty. You want to use it to cover attraction to anyone who's not an adult so you can use that taboo to shame a wider group of people for their attractions? Gee, sounds a lot like your groomer complaint, doesn't it?

Yes, I am aware of the technical definition. Do you think that those who bandy about the term "groomer" know or care? Or is it more likely that they are using it in the popular sense, in which "the word pedophilia is often applied to any sexual interest in children or the act of child sexual abuse, including any sexual interest in minors below the local age of consent, regardless of their level of physical or mental development"?

As for "moaning," are you saying it is OK to make baseless charges of sexual impropriety or base motives? I don't, whether that be the left calling everything "racism" or the right calling everything "grooming."

Yes, I am aware of the technical definition. Do you think that those who bandy about the term "groomer" know or care? Or is it more likely that they are using it in the popular sense, in which "the word pedophilia is often applied to any sexual interest in children or the act of child sexual abuse, including any sexual interest in minors below the local age of consent, regardless of their level of physical or mental development"?

Of course they don't, which was exactly my point! The popular definition gets expanded to cover a wider group because people want to exploit the taboo for social power. If you are going to argue it is wrong to expand the definition of groomers, then it was wrong to have expanded the definition of pedophile to the point that "groomer" became synonymous with it.

As for "moaning," are you saying it is OK to make baseless charges of sexual impropriety or base motives? I don't, whether that be the left calling everything "racism" or the right calling everything "grooming."

No, I'm just frustrated that progressive arguments, arguments that the "groomer" narrative targets, used to excuse sexual harassment and abuse I endured growing up are being defended. I'm frustrated that I grew up to find out I'm attracted to kids, but not exclusively, and that those experiences make it extremely difficult to have relationships with the adults I am attracted to. I'm frustrated that rather than asking themselves what they can do to prevent abuse like I experienced, people would rather deflect to the boogieman of pedophilia without concern for what impact that would have on people like me. In short, I see your protestations as nothing more than one last "fuck you" from the people who abused me.

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My go-to reference for this is Alexandra Rowland, who was 25.

Otoh, if I say that Gender Queer might not be a threat to children, I run the risk of being accused of being a pedophile.

Do you really think that that's the case in popular society? I think it's only a problem on spaces that are fairly explicitly non-leftist.

This isn't (just) "leftward behavior". For instance, during the time some years ago when there were a lot of Islamist terrorist attacks in Europe, if one mentioned that becoming a victim of Islamic terrorism was similarly a vanishingly rare possibility equivalent of car accidents etc., you would get chewed out - though it would rather be phrased as "naivete, not understanding the reality of Jihad, leftists loving the Muslims" etc.

I used to make that argument quite regularly, and never got chewed out, so I'm not sure what you're talking about.

Being against the Iraq war was bit more risky, by my estimation, but nothing compared to the sort of ostracizm you go through, if you're not on board modern progressivism.

Well, I guess that experiences simply differ here.

Of course the difference might be that when one makes the argument and simultaneously is known to occupy an explicitly left-wing position, it becomes easier for the other side to just see it as culture warring and respond to it within the framework.

Seconded, for my experience in northeast America. Here, it was always popular to argue that terrorism wasn't that big a deal (let's say at least since 2003), and it was also always popular to argue against the Iraq war.

i feel like the reason it was popular to argue those things was because at the time it seemed like the broad consensus was that the threat of terrorism was a big deal and that the Iraq war was justified because of it. i don’t really hear those arguments much anymore cause there’s not as many people to argue about it with, but the argument described in the OP seems like it follows the same underlying logic

Reading this anecdote was a little confusing to me. That is, your confusion is confusing to me. Of course this is what happens when you act that way. I could have predicted that.

But I do realize, that I can't explain exactly why. I could give a thought-terminating cliche like "virtue signaling" or something, but I don't think it would actually explain anything. I don't think there's a grand psychological theory that can bring you peace.

I think even the closest friends I have behave this way, to a certain approximation. No, none of my friends care about gay people. But, if I shit talked their favorite anime, they'd defend it. To a different group of friends, if I shit talked McDonald's, I'd be banned from the groupchat for months before being invited back in like nothing happened.

Did anything bad happen with your friends because of this? Did you get excommunicated? You apologized, but maybe you were taking it too seriously? Friends have gentle friction all the time, and even you admitted the dogpile was gentle. I agree that cancel culture is real, and out there it can be brutal, but were your friends really being brutal, just because they were talking about the gays?

He didn't shit talk anyone though, he was just trying to temper the high emotions with rational data. The pushback against data in favor of emotions, claiming it's better for people to live their lives based on their own flawed perception, as pushed through the media and popular consensus, is what's scary to me, here. These people should have been comforted by the fact that they're safer than they thought, not upset by it.

temper the high emotions with rational data

Well this is sort of the point. In what seems like a friendly sort of space, not some terminally online debate forum, it's not really good manners to respond to 'high emotions' with a lecture about probabilities and car crashes. He was right to make the point, but made it in the wrong way.

if I shit talked McDonald's, I'd be banned from the groupchat for months

I had no identity idea McDonald's had such intense brand loyalty.

I had no identity

This is not a coincidence...

Going to echo some other posters, and say it seems like you made the crucial mistake of trying to reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into. I've had ample experience on this with my wife - who, as one might imagine, trusts me and cares a great deal about what I have to say. With that big of a handicap, I should be able to convince her to not worry about things, right? Wrong. She doesn't get mad, she knows I'm just trying to help, but ultimately my attempts at reason don't help her. What she actually wants/needs from me is "I'm sorry you had to deal with that, that really sucks".

Now that's just my wife, but my experience has taught me that the same is true of people generally. If they are irrationally afraid of something, it simply does not matter what you tell them to try to get through. They didn't reason themselves into those emotions, and reason won't get them out. Or, in the cynical case of "they are acting like victims to achieve status", then your reasoning doesn't address what they actually think. Either way, it doesn't work.

Nothing you can do to fight human nature, sadly. Just remember for next time that reason isn't going to work there.

I think you're right that a lot of this is about the emotional response. Without having seen the original conversation, I can easily believe that this is less about "I am specifically scared that there will be a mass shooting next time I am in a gay bar" and more about "I have feelings about the possibility that there are people out there who might hate me enough to kill me, in conjuction with the existence of other people who wouldn't kill me but still hate me." If you address the former in a way that invalidates the latter, then you're going to ruffle feathers.

It might help to deliberately try to phrase the calm-down in a way that actively validates the surrounding messy feelings. As in, "If you are specifically worried about being shot, then I think you can be reassured that the chances of this actually happening to you are very low. But of course I also understand that there are other reasons why you might have really strong feelings about this."

mistake of trying to reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into

As a general statement this just isn't true. I imagine everyone here has 'reasoned themselves out of' dozens of positions they've adopted because they were social/political convention. There are of course a ton of specific cases where 'convincing people' doesn't work, but it greatly depends on broader context, how you approach and talk, etc. I mean - otherwise, how could societal change happen at all?

As a general statement this just isn't true.

No, I think he's right. And it's not that people never change their mind based on reason, it's just that these instances are dwarfed by the amount of times they change their mind based on peer pressure, media, and having opinions banned (or a combination of all of these).

I think it is true as a general statement. In the battle between the subconscious and reason, reason is going to lose every single time. At best you can reason someone into changing their behavior, but you can't reason them into changing their mind. I certainly wish it weren't true, because I view it as a great human failing. But I think it is true nonetheless.

The subconscious will win out initially if entrenched (if not, it's just "huh, I learned something"), but it will remember the counterargument and be weakened in its conviction. Repeat a few times and you can change the subconscious mind. Adjusting with new information is just how humans learn.

However, I do believe that "You can't reason someone out of an emotion they didn't reason themselves into" is mostly* true, and "Scared of X" is an emotional response. You can potentially reason someone out of a position that incites emotion, but the emotion itself will remain. If I'm worried, then I might be convinced nothing will go wrong, but I will still be worried.

This obviously becomes a problem when, like in OP's example, people make it about the emotions themselves.

  • It can be done and is called therapy, but it requires highly trained professionals, lots of time and effort, and the target's cooperation.

I think it is true as a general statement. In the battle between the subconscious and reason, reason is going to lose every single time.

Well that just intuitively sounds wrong to me. /s

I would echo @MathiasTRex's advice in never engaging in these kinds of discussion online. But I would also say that I think you misread the situation. People were upset after a mass shooting (hate crime?). They were venting and perhaps trying to solicit some sympathy/attention. Wading in with the "well, actually" doesn't really help anybody even if you are, indisputably, 100% correct. This is the kind of situation where more social intelligence and less rational intelligence helps.

I only offer this advice because I myself walk blindly into these snares all the time, and have to try really hard to bite my tongue and not impose Rational Logic™ on people's feelings

Wading in with the "well, actually" doesn't really help anybody even if you are, indisputably, 100% correct

Surely it does help (if it's heeded at all) to the extent that the person's statement isn't totally untrue? If they're going to actually be worried, or act differently in the future, about lgbtq mass shootings, understanding it's not a meaningful risk could reduce that. Which benefits them because they don't take unnecessary action, waste time, avoid useful activity for no reason. I'd personally be annoyed if, e.g., the comments on reddit posts about murders where people said "OMG THIS IS SO SCARY" didn't have replies saying "well, ackshually, P(car crash|LGBT) = 1000 * P(mass shooting|LGBT), so there's nothing to worry about", because that's valuable information. And more generally, 'being scared after a reported violent event', and being upset/fear generally, is an ... adaptation that helps people avoid harm in the future, that's why that particular set of mechanisms evolved. Using that to be afraid in cases of actual harm is just better! "Feeling" does not mean "whenever something might upset someone, that means it shouldn't happen" - it refers to a bunch of contingent adaptations / tendencies with many different roles, and 'feelings' and 'rational logic' are deeply intertwined (i.e., the ability to infer that 'lgbt mass shooting' means 'i might die' is as 'logical' as anything else). That this particular response breaks a social norm isn't because "Rational Logic^{tm}" and feelings don't mix, it's just that ... the response breaks a specific social norm, and OP cares more about other consequences of the response than that social norm.

I think the middle path here is to wait to see if OP's friend is actually serious about not going out anymore or was just expressing their feelings in the moment.

I would agree if I'd received more generic insensitivity responses, but I specifically got "good ally tips" about not talking. Which makes me think less of the people responding that way even if I did misread the situation.

I would agree if I'd received more generic insensitivity responses, but I specifically got "good ally tips"

You committed a faux pas. That is to say, you violated community norms, but not enough to get actually ejected from the community.

The "good ally tips" are the community norms.

I share an online space with some friends and some acquaintances for general purpose discussion

If someone showed as little respect for me as everyone in your anecdote showed for you I would not consider them a friend.

I fold in the spots where I'm 60% fave for all my money to save it for the 75% spots.

???

What does this mean, or have to do with the discussion? It's formatted as a quote but I can't find it in OP or anywhere else.

I copied the wrong thing from my clipboard, I edited

I'm still curious what it means though?

It's a poker metaphor. Basically it means when confronted by a momentous decision with high personal stakes, it is sometimes better to eschew a profitable but high-variance situation in order to wait for an even better situation.

I was replying to someone on Reddit about their conservative poker strategy and I accidentally had their comment in my clipboard instead of the motte poster I was replying to here. For the record my reply to the poker poster was that their numbers were off and that being a 60% favorite is actually a huge edge and not a marginal spot at all in a game like poker.

Identity politics.

It doesn't matter what happened or why. It also doesn't matter what you think or what your friends think (and how they think "it"). The only thing that matters is what someone felt and who someone is. That's the goal of the interaction you interfered in, walked right in with your boots muddy with logic, and hands dripping with questions.

It's a branch of collectivism, of elevating the whole over the parts, and simply put: you were an individual interacting with a multi-bodied organism, which rejected you as any body does a foreign object.

deleted

People get clout by being a member of an oppressed group*. If you say that these attacks are rare then you are attacking their status by making their group look less victimized. The Coronavirus panic was basically this on a large scale: everybody had the chance to look important by being performatively terrified of a miniscule risk of death. Of course once you start playing the game you usually are able to talk yourself into genuinely feeling afraid which I'm sure is unpleasant, so they suffer for it in the end.

*oppressed in the popular imagination, actual oppression is optional

My version of this take: being safe feels good, but being demonstrably right about the threat feels useful and actionable. GP was trying to make their friend feel better, but at the level of the "group strategy module", they were raining on their parade. Why were they denying the group rhetorical ammunition?

This just depends on the people, I have serious (including politics-related) discussions with some of my irl friends over group messages all the time, although even face-to-face we're not worried about upsetting someone generally.

Fear is an excuse to hate.

You're fucking up their hate party, man. Quit killing the buzz.

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