Stuff like “stupid, idiot, moron, dumb,” you know the ones. If you’re insulting someone for their shitty garbage beliefs and all you can manage to come up with is ways to insult their intelligence, appearance, or other aspect about them that has nothing to do with their cruelty and shittyness, you should maybe reevaluate.
Just saw a thread on here where a user was stubbornly refusing to adjust their language when another user politely pointed out that it was harmful to our comrades as well, and the person refusing was massively upvoted and the comrade trying to explain why it was harmful was downvoted. Thought we were better than that
I’m not calling anyone out, just wanted to make a post explaining my feelings on it and that when stuff like that happens (not the intelligence based insults, I know its hard to switch, but getting insulted for asking people to avoid them) it hurts and makes me feel less welcome here </3
Using words like “You’re being ignorant” or “That’s a cruel belief” is actually more effective than just going “lmao idiot”.
If those are the words you actually mean to convey I’d say use them instead :)
Edit: if the reception this post got isn’t a good proof that this is something this community needs to grapple with, I don’t know what is.
Yeah I get you, and I’m certainly guilty of that as well. The main issue really is associating “Having a brain that works good” with being a good person, and having a brain that doesn’t work good with being a bad person
I feel you. I just think, past a certain point, it really isn’t at all different from calling someone a chud or a dog or a pig. I don’t see any difference between calling someone a snake and saying they have a beehive for a brain. Words like removed, psycho, and schizoid are obviously awful and I don’t think anyone should use them but you really get into the territory of “nobody should be insulted ever for anything” territory if “smooth brain” is considered on the same level as removed. Of course I’m not the ultimate authority on the issue and I definitely won’t knock you not using that language.
You’re right, its certainly not on the same level, and I’d never claim it was!
I’m just of the mind that it’s not useful, it doesn’t make for good insults in any way to affect change in whoever you’re insulting, and it causes harm to some. Just don’t think it’s worth it, y’know?
Yeah, I understand what you’re saying and I agree with you for the most part. Just thought I should add my own thoughts. It does hurt me a bit when people use actual ableist slurs in here like the aforementioned ones. It’s some insults which arguably are ableist, aren’t at all connected to any actual human experience and aren’t particularly harmful, imo. Like calling Zuck a robot/lizard person.
