protected class...what should I do

[Cheerful]

Another vote for free speech.  Long live the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Diversity is important:  free exchange of diverse viewpoints is essential to a free society.  Listening to people with whom I disagree is useful.  Readers who disagree with others' opinions shouldn't have power to abolish the discussion.

Thank you moderators.

[mamselle]

So, since writingprof cloaks mean-spiritedness towards others (not only here, but often...that's one of 5 posters whose entries I automatically bypass) under the wider blazon of free speech, we're upholding wit and nastiness as more valuable than kindness and consideration?

There are ways to indicate difference without being rude, accusatory, snarky, or mean.

People leave (I know of two who have told me so) because they get tired of that shoddy level of discourse being protected.

Some of us stay to try to provide ballast against the snark, but it's dispiriting at times.

Posturing, blowsy rebuttals of every single line of a post, like a legal brief, and thickly laid-on squawks of outrage at the tiniest indication that not everyone believes their fairytale-constructed universe of denials and defamations, weigh too heavily on our discourse here.

I don't want the fora to be cruel, and they don't have to be.

But that strain of viral output is what makes it so.

I'm with apostrophe--cut it out, people.

M.

[marshwiggle]

squawks of outrage at the tiniest indication that not everyone believes their fairytale-constructed universe of denials and defamations

Doesn't this describe the most angry people on all sides of any issue?

[mamselle]

No.

M.

[Cheerful]

So, since writingprof cloaks mean-spiritedness towards others (not only here, but often...that's one of 5 posters whose entries I automatically bypass) under the wider blazon of free speech, we're upholding wit and nastiness as more valuable than kindness and consideration?

There are ways to indicate difference without being rude, accusatory, snarky, or mean.

People leave (I know of two who have told me so) because they get tired of that shoddy level of discourse being protected.

Some of us stay to try to provide ballast against the snark, but it's dispiriting at times.

Posturing, blowsy rebuttals of every single line of a post, like a legal brief, and thickly laid-on squawks of outrage at the tiniest indication that not everyone believes their fairytale-constructed universe of denials and defamations, weigh too heavily on our discourse here.

I don't want the fora to be cruel, and they don't have to be.

But that strain of viral output is what makes it so.

I'm with apostrophe--cut it out, people.

M.

So you want to be the Free Speech Police and determine what qualifies as wit, snark, nastiness, kindness, consideration, posturing, defamation, and so on? 

With all due respect, I'm glad you're not a moderator here.  Was that unkind to say?  Should I be banned?

I don't like some of your posts and surely you don't like some/all of mine.  Start erasing them and no more free speech, no more free society, no more fora worth visiting.

[mamselle]

No, and I'm sorry if any of my posts have bothered you.

If you want to let me know how, either by PM or directly, I'll try to amend whatever I can that is troublesome.

When people complain about a poster, that needs to be attended to.

Hopefully the poster themselves will do that, and not need to be asked to tone it down.

But those who are tone-deaf to such requests may need something more specific.

I had just joined the Forum when Pry was banned, for ten days, for I know not what--the posts were deleted, I think.

But that's been a rallying cry for speech freedoms for awhile now, and not always with good result.

Your right to swing your fist stops where the other person's nose begins.

M.

[marshwiggle]

Your right to swing your fist stops where the other person's nose begins.

That's an easy standard to apply with such clearly defined things as "fist" and "nose".

Suppose instead someone said
"Your right to smell bad stops where the other person's sense of smell begins."

Similar in principle, but highly problematic in practice for a whole lot of reasons. The first being no-one can know how strong someone else's sense of smell is, and how offensive a smell needs to be before they can't stand it. (Or for that matter, even what smells are "bad" and what aren't.)

I would argue that this is much more like the case in discussions here.

[writingprof]

Apostrophe, here is the post I believe you're referring to:

OP, are you white?  I strongly suspect so, but please pardon me if I'm mistaken.  The reason I suspected you of trollery is that a white person converting to Islam in order to get the diversity points and victim status is the reductio ad absurdum of identity politics.  In other words, your post reads like something I would have written here to annoy the Elizabeth Warren crowd.

I have highlighted the section in question.

Wrtingprof did not accuse the poster of "converting to Islam in order to get the diversity points and victim status"; he pointed out the absurdity of a society where that would be potentially worthwhile. If anything was insinuated, it was the irony of the poster's question.

Thank you. Yes. I want to be very clear that I am not questioning the sincerity of anyone's conversion. However, I think there could and should be broad agreement here that the OP's ideas are not only obnoxious to conservative sensibilities but harmful to the minority protections that most people in this country broadly support.

The OP is not worried that she will be fired for being a Muslim. No one knows about her religion. Rather, she wants to turn a well-meaning and necessary set of anti-discrimination laws into a system of political hierarchies in which, all other things being equal, no person in a protected class can be fired until all employees outside of a protected class have been terminated first. Do we really think that such a system is likely to endure in a diverse democracy? Isn't it more likely that such a system would do harm to the cause of actual minority protections?

That's why, at the very beginning of this thread, I (half-seriously) accused the OP of trolling. The idea she expressed is every conservative's (and many moderates') worst nightmare. Indeed, it's such a moral abomination that one rarely hears a public defense of it. "Other white people should be fired before me because I'm a Muslim and they're not"? Friends, we can't--and won't--live like that.

[spork]

I'm surprised no one has questioned the term "white Muslim" yet, which, if I'm reading it correctly, contains an assumption that the default non-convert "Muslim" isn't white.

[dismalist]

Apostrophe, here is the post I believe you're referring to:

OP, are you white?  I strongly suspect so, but please pardon me if I'm mistaken.  The reason I suspected you of trollery is that a white person converting to Islam in order to get the diversity points and victim status is the reductio ad absurdum of identity politics.  In other words, your post reads like something I would have written here to annoy the Elizabeth Warren crowd.

I have highlighted the section in question.

Wrtingprof did not accuse the poster of "converting to Islam in order to get the diversity points and victim status"; he pointed out the absurdity of a society where that would be potentially worthwhile. If anything was insinuated, it was the irony of the poster's question.

Thank you. Yes. I want to be very clear that I am not questioning the sincerity of anyone's conversion. However, I think there could and should be broad agreement here that the OP's ideas are not only obnoxious to conservative sensibilities but harmful to the minority protections that most people in this country broadly support.

The OP is not worried that she will be fired for being a Muslim. No one knows about her religion. Rather, she wants to turn a well-meaning and necessary set of anti-discrimination laws into a system of political hierarchies in which, all other things being equal, no person in a protected class can be fired until all employees outside of a protected class have been terminated first. Do we really think that such a system is likely to endure in a diverse democracy? Isn't it more likely that such a system would do harm to the cause of actual minority protections?

That's why, at the very beginning of this thread, I (half-seriously) accused the OP of trolling. The idea she expressed is every conservative's (and many moderates') worst nightmare. Indeed, it's such a moral abomination that one rarely hears a public defense of it. "Other white people should be fired before me because I'm a Muslim and they're not"? Friends, we can't--and won't--live like that.

Well, we already do. This brings us into the weeds of intersectionality. There is a solution with an excellent pedigree: Individualism! :-)

[apostrophe]

No.

M.

:)

[polly_mer]

So, since writingprof cloaks mean-spiritedness towards others (not only here, but often...that's one of 5 posters whose entries I automatically bypass) under the wider blazon of free speech, we're upholding wit and nastiness as more valuable than kindness and consideration?

What should a reader make of a term like "rectangular firing squad".  Is that kind?  Considerate?  Helpful to promoting a high level of discourse when it's clearly 4 specific individuals who annoy you with their interactions and views instead of a generic term focused on behavior that anyone could exhibit?

It's easy to be tolerant towards those who are espousing views we individually like at a volume that is comfortable to us.

The need for tolerance is exactly when one most wants to roll one's eyes and say, yep, we get it; please go espouse it elsewhere.  In some of the academic discussion communities I frequent, a commonly voiced belief is that calls for civility are often used against the people who should most be listened to because they have the most to offer in terms of what isn't going well and what could be changed to be a more fair/just/inclusive group.  Calls for civility are used to mark folks as "other" and ensure they remain marginalized because "people like us would never say such things and therefore those others clearly aren't us; those others should change, shut up, or go away".

To single out apostrophe in particular as someone who just volunteered on this thread to be discussed, I don't know you, apostrophe, and therefore wonder why you think your opinion should be more influential on how these fora go than people who are regulars.  You can write what you like because I am a die-hard free-speech person, but regulars, even those with whom I disagree about nearly everything, have more influence on how these fora should be than someone who is new and wants us all to change to suit them.

Anyone can become a regular merely by showing up and participating enough that one shows a consistent personality with definite views.  As for those who left, the door is open and they can rejoin us at any time.  However, I am absolutely not going to moderate myself or others for having strong views that are disagreeable to delicate flowers.  Personal stalking or jumping during a personal crisis are different matters, but disagreeing on something important and not always being polite about it are things I value more than civility or kindness as a general ethos.

[mahagonny]

moved to 'asides.'

[Caracal]

disagreeing on something important and not always being polite about it are things I value more than civility or kindness as a general ethos.

These things aren't actually in opposition to each other. It is perfectly possible to disagree without being a jerk about it. It just requires avoiding personal remarks and assumptions about people's motivations.

[Cheerful]

disagreeing on something important and not always being polite about it are things I value more than civility or kindness as a general ethos.

These things aren't actually in opposition to each other. It is perfectly possible to disagree without being a jerk about it. It just requires avoiding personal remarks and assumptions about people's motivations.

Another vote for free speech combined with civility.