A Crash Course in Feminism Mk. II (or, why everyone should be a feminist)

[eldargal]

There's slurs used against swathes of every culture, sadly we're unlikely to get rid of them all any time soon.

Yeah but the affect you mroe depending on who you are. Slurs against some white guy? Does nothing but hurt the feelings maybe. Slurs against women and other groups with less social power feed into systems of oppression that the people usually making the slur aren't even aware of. Even a relatively harmless word like bossy becomes a slur when used against women for example because it de-legitimises their leadership in a way that men are not subjected to.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

I don't call them femi****s, I call them extremists.

[eldargal]

I don't call them femi****s, I call them extremists.

Which is an appropriate term for radfems and terfs. They are extremist and they aren't proper feminists.

[Psychosplodge]

In that case its being misused, at least how I consider it.
On first reading of the tweet I lol'd reading it as sarcastic,
If it isn't sarcasm my reaction is "how do people that dumb survive?"

[Mr Mystery]

Which is an appropriate term for radfems and terfs. They are extremist and they aren't proper feminists.

It's the same issue Muslims face. Literally a handful go off the deep end, and BOOM, all Muslims are considered terrorists and nutcases until proven otherwise.

Man, I hope white males never feel threatened by the success and progress of white males.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

I will note however that there are good and bad extremists; Che Guevara, Guy Fawkes, Angela Davis, Vilma Lucila Espin, etc
All are extremists, whether they are good or bad is up to opinion.

[Mr Mystery]

Not to mention Christian Fundamentalists, who seem utterly, utterly oblivious to the fact they are at least as nutty as those they claim to be protecting us against. Yes you, Britain First.

Also, [url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-28197785]possible mansplanation[/url]. He wasn't violent. He was the runt of the litter. Who happened to go mental on a shooting spree because women inexplicably didn't find a spoilt, self centred egotist at all attractive.

[CoffeeGrunt]

Slurs against some white guy? Does nothing but hurt the feelings maybe.

"Does nothing but hurt the feelings maybe," is discounting those feelings off-hand as being unimportant, that's a bias. Calling a woman a slur could also, "do nothing but hurt the feelings maybe." Calling an African man a racial slur may also, "do nothing but hurt the feelings maybe."

I had a friend who started bombarding me with posts about "White Privilege," she herself also being white. The idea was that we were both so vastly better off than all other races, that we couldn't help but just do better in life due to being white. I personally didn't like the concept of being told that any achievements I make in life are down to my skin colour, (which admittedly is a bit like the blood donor that couldn't say no, despite sunny British weather.) Apparently me trying to say that the things I have are down to hard work and endeavor is also white privilege, as is any other attempts to try and claim that as a white person, you really don't care about skin colour.

I dunno, personally I'm just a little bit sick of the online SJWs trying to shame every white person they can find for events hundreds of years past. Every other culture has practiced horrible things, and the result is demeaning movies like Avatar trying to make out that White, Western culture is the only civilisation to have owned superior technology and have forged empires from it, ignoring all the great empires of all the other nations past.

[Gotthammer]

It's not about shame, it's about recognising that the system is stacked a certain way. And the moment you say things like "most men" or "some white people" it creates room for people to not have to critically analyse their own actions. Privilege exists. I'm white, so I grew up with an education, with resources and without a social stigma portraying me as lazy, or thuggish or the like. I grew up free from racist abuse, with parents who didn't experience racism in the workplace so they had money to provide me with a decent education. I lived in a neighbourhood with low unemployment and plenty of community funding so youth crime wasn't an issue. My race did not give me my achievements free of charge but they certainly gave me a boost up in life than people of colour would get.

And obviously a slur can hurt someone's feelings and that is bad, I doubt EG is advocating going around insulting people - but it doesn't carry the masses of social baggage that slurs against minorities and the otherwise oppressed do. It reminds you of your second class status in society - not for everyone, no, but I'd wager more minorities would be hurt more deeply by a slur directed at them than one against a white man. Also note that there are basically no slurs against white people, yet there are reams and reams for everyone else. That the English language doesn't even allow the same amount of linguistic humiliation to be heaped upon white men as it does everyone else in the world should tell you there's a power imbalance.

Also:

Ron Weasley’s character is consciously written as somewhat racist. Not as racist as Malfoy, of course - he doesn’t scoff at mudbloods and halfbloods, and he doesn’t see himself as superior at all. Still, he unquestionably accepts the inferior position of house elves (they love serving), when he finds out that Lupin’s werewolf his reaction is not only scared but also disgusted (Don’t touch me!) and he is clearly very uncomfortable finding out that Hagrid is half-giant (giants are wild and savage).

And this is brilliant. Because it demonstrates that racism isn’t only present in clearly malicious and evil people, in the Malfoys and Blacks - it’s also there in warm, kind, funny people who just happened to learn some pretty toxic things growing up in a pretty toxic society. And they can unlearn them too, with some time and effort. Ron eventually accepts Hagrid’s parentage, lets Lupin bandage his leg and in the final battle, he worries about the safety of the house elves.

Some people are prejudiced because they are evil, and some people are prejudiced because they don’t know better yet. And those people can learn better, and become better people. And that’s an important lesson. The lesson taught about discrimination shouldn’t be “only evil people do it”, because then all readers will assume it doesn't apply to them. Instead old JK teaches us “you too are probably doing it, and you should do stop ASAP”.

It's not things hundreds of years past, not by a long shot.

[Psychosplodge]

I will note however that there are good and bad extremists; Che Guevara

Che Guevara was a vicious murderer and would probably happily shoot most of the people wearing his image