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raybear

This post by

naamah_darling is one of those things I wish I'd written myself. Luckily, I can also just plug/bookmark it.

[Courtesy of

fightingwords]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

magdalene1.livejournal.com

Nice.

Also, that car poster I posted a while back was douchey. Sorry.

From:

raybear.livejournal.com

Eh, there was some truth in it too. I thought it sort of funny that I was ranting about the issue nearly simultaneously with you posting it (it appeared several times on my friends page/facebook/twittering that week).

From:

magdalene1.livejournal.com

Back to your friend's awesome rant, I'm trying to remember a video I saw of someone explaining how to call someone out on racism/sexism etc. The correct way isn't "you are racist", because people will always deny. The correct way is to say "that thing you said or did is racist." Hopefully get past some of the immediate defensive filters, allows for the possibility of changing the person's mind, can use a more objective standard for evaluating it.

From:

raybear.livejournal.com

I think my pretend boyfriend Jay Smooth did that video? I think its definitely a good technique, though I still have run into some problems with the strategy, people are still inferring that they are racist and getting defensive. My favorite techinique is responding with pure 100% cluelessness about it, rather than indignance. Like when someone says "that's so gay", I stop and look and confused and say "how is that related to gay?" (I wish I could say homosexual and not laugh) and then the person usually kinda stutters around, or says, its just a saying, and then I reply, "but I don't get it." And usually just shrug and let it go. This has been fairly effective in pointing out the ridiculousness of something bigoted without needing to hold anyone's hand or stroke anyone's ego or even have a prolonged conversation about it.

I'm actually really interested in the concept of 'crassness' and humor and how it doesn't have to be linked to bigotry in any form, but instead can be applied to parties in power who NEED to be de-pedestaled, versus people who use 'humor' to cleverly deride people who already have a pretty shitty life. Because I'm sure you can also appreciate, I get as equally outraged by people being boring and lazy in their supposed creativity!