sparr: (Default)
One potential goal of communication is to move a factual idea from your head to my head, something about the state of the world.
 
A different goal of communication is to implant a feeling in my mind, making me feel happy or angry or sad or worried.
 
Often, these two goals are compatible, and capable speakers/writers can accomplish both more often than the average person.
 
When you prioritize the second goal, specifically for negative emotions, at the expense of the first, you engage in "weaponization of language". That is, using words to propagate emotions regardless of how inapplicable their meaning might be to the given situation.
 
If there are people who are helped by emotions being attached to those words, you are hurting them. If there are people helped by effective communication of the ideas connected to those words or connected to the words that would better convey the idea you have in mind, you are hurting them.
 
ExpandExamples... )
 
More recent less common example: "misgendering". When you use this word you know that you are evoking emotions associated with someone using "she"/"woman" to refer to a transgender man, or vice versa, or increasingly now using gendered words to refer to a nonbinary/genderneutral person. Most people do not think that "e" and "they" and "ze" are different genders, just different words for referring to nb/gn-ness. Using "misgendering" to refer to the situation where I use "they" instead of "ze" is detrimental to all future discussion about issues around gender and pronouns, and devalues the pain and struggle of transgender individuals who are frequently actually misgendered.
 

If you don't want to cause those outcomes, you should refrain from engaging in this behavior. 
sparr: (Default)
  1. She / her / hers (cisgender woman)
  2. She / her / hers (transgender woman)
  3. They / them / their
  4. E / em / eir (and other popularized sets)
  5. Unique invented pronoun set
  6. Ella / la / suya (and other foreign sets)
  7. She / her / hers / "call me a man"
  8. She / him / their
  9. You / you / your
  10. 9. I / me / my
These are a sample of the personal pronoun preferences I have encountered, plus the implied binary opposite for the relevant entries. They are ranked roughly in decreasing order of frequency with which I encounter people willing and able to honor them, and to punish others for failing to honor or at least try to. Everyone is ok with #0, most liberal/progressive people are ok with #1 and increasingly often #2, things get fuzzy past that, and nobody is ok with #9. Of course most people draw a line in the "only" "reasonable" "obvious" "respectful" place in between and consider discussion of where those lines are to be extremely disrespectful.
  1. What is the highest number you have seen in the wild?
  2. What is the highest number you have successfully trained yourself to honor for someone, and who?
  3. What is the highest number you would socially punish someone for not trying to honor?
  4. What is the highest number you would socially punish someone for failing to honor?
My answers are 7, 2 for an ex-partner, 2, and 1.
sparr: (Default)
 This is a post about half of the people that I know. If this post is not about you then it is not about you.
 
ExpandRead more... )
You: "Of course not, it's not his fault or responsibility that people react negatively to him just because he looks weird, nor does he deserve punishment for it."
 
Them: "A hot guy did X. I caught his eye I gave him a wink. We're having drinks tonight, wish me luck."
Also You: "You go girl!", "Woo", "Get some", "Lucky!"
 
Them: "A guy did X. It made me uncomfortable."
Also You: "Ugh", "guys like that are creeps", "that's why I avoid [place X happens]"
 
You appear to be exhibiting cognitive dissonance. Your beliefs seem to be incompatible with each other. If you think there is some line to be drawn here that explains your apparently contradictory responses then I would very much like to know where that line is. I do not fault you for having emotional reactions to things. I do fault you for using your emotions as an excuse to treat people in ways that your other actions show you know are inappropriate.
 
 

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Clarence "Sparr" Risher

February 2025

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