sandbox
It’s in the nature of the far-right to co-opt the language and aesthetics of others, especially the left. That’s why the nazi party called themselves national socialists.
But ultimately, they’re right - if we remain placid in the face of the erasure of the rights of minorities, they will have their way. The media and electoral politics have been fully captured by the ruling elite, who would rather have an authoritarian theocratic dictatorship than an equitable world. Our only option is a revolution at this point - as peaceful as we can make it, by withholding the working class’s labour from the elite while supporting one-another - but it is almost entirely impossible that they would allow our revolution to remain peaceful. Therefore, those of us who can must be ready and willing to fight on the behalf of those who can not.
I am going to continue to use the phrase because it contains a powerful truth, my hope is that people who see it and hear it will move even slightly more towards accepting the reality of the situation that we’re all in, and start working on building solidarity, mutual aid, and getting involved in activism outside the realm of electoral politics.
I already said that I don’t speak for all disabled people, though, anecdotally, in groups that I’m in (I volunteer with a disability support group), the terms special and special needs are often highlighted as ableist terms that disabled people find offensive or get used against them as slurs. Some research online also bears that out, a number of reputable sources online have recommended avoiding the use of the terms special and special needs.
It doesn’t really particularly matter whether you’re disabled or not. This isn’t about identity, it’s about using a slur. If you had used the n-word as part of a joke and got backlash I think you’d understand this a bit better.
You’re being pretty callous around the fact that you genuinely emotionally hurt me, I’ve been as respectful, kind and considerate of you and your feelings as I can be. How do you expect to build a people-led movement to dismantle the exploitation of the working class if you can’t bring yourself to even care for one other person? On just a human level, I’m not trying to have an argument where I one-up you or something like that, this isn’t some debate to win or lose, I’m just talking to you, human to human, and trying to help you to understand that you’re unintentionally hurting people who are one of the most vulnerable minorities in society.
I truly hope that you’re just being a bit edgy and that in future you really will think twice about this kind of thing, regardless of what you write now.
I’m doing a lot, I’m a trained union representative in the IWW and I’ve been active for a few years there. Lots of grass roots organising and direct action. But this isn’t about me, it’s about systemic issues and those in power aren’t going to be willing to give up that power without a fight. We have to be ready for that fight or we will lose and have to deal with the consequences. Do you think violence was justified against fascism in the 20th century? If so, why not in the 21st?
I understand that you probably don’t really recognise the impact of ableist slurs, but as someone who has been bullied, harassed, beaten up and sexually assaulted by people mocking me by using those slurs, they trigger a bit of a traumatic response. It’s not that they’re directed at anyone in particular, it’s just that they’re never possible to use in reference to disabled people without being, at the very least, extremely patronising, and extremely dehumanising at the worst.
I completely get that you didn’t intend any harm, and you were trying to criticise the IDF in your own way, and I’m really sympathetic towards that: fuck the IDF, 100%, they’re incredibly evil.
All I am doing is just asking you to please reconsider using ableist slurs as jokes in the future, that’s all. We’re all human, we all make mistakes, and it’s a completely normal reaction to protect our own ego when someone tells us that we hurt them in some way, so I don’t blame you for your reaction, but please try to overcome that knee-jerk reaction <3
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable“ - John F. Kennedy
I want a peaceful revolution more than anything, but it’s clear that it’s impossible. Join the IWW today.
As a disabled person, “special” in reference to disabled people is imo one of the worst ableist slurs, I find it more offensive than retard. my experience isn’t universal, but I just wanted to let you know, I know it was just a joke and I don’t want to make you feel bad, but I have to be honest and say, it does hurt a bit to see it.
Yeah, because the individual-level studies aren’t worth shit, that’s the point. They’re like the scientific level of analogies. You get these studies that are on like, 15 people or whatever that make some statistically significant finding, then it later turns out that they either very selectively chose their test subjects, the methodology was a complete joke, they p-hacked the findings into worthlessness or all of the above. If the individual level studies scaled up, if they were actually finding something real, they would be reflected in population-level studies. The fact that they aren’t pretty clearly demonstrates that there isn’t a strong correlation.
Low weight is a significant health issue in wealthy countries too. It’s a massive contributor to mortality rates, as much as high adiposity is. But it’s not discussed because it’s less popular to bully people for being skinny as it is to bully people for being fat.
But sure, I’m the one who refuses to change his mind when challenged.
That’s a fun paper, because they basically find no actual negative health effect, then just ignore that fact and continue as if they did.
First, the global focus on the obesity epidemic has largely overshadowed the persistence of underweight in some countries. Our results show the need to address the remaining underweight problem
Second, although adiposity has been consistently shown to be an independent risk factor for several NCDs in individual-level epidemiological studies, at the population level, the effect of rising BMI on the course of mortality reduction has so far been somewhat small in high-income countries
All the study shows is that as people get richer they can overcome being underweight, which is an incredibly good thing - it reduces health risks significantly. Then it goes back to the usual moral panic shit about how that’s actually a bad thing.
Essentially everything you ever heard about weight and fat is ideological, not scientific, in basis. Research consistently finds results that aren’t statistically significant, then just blathers about how that statistically significant result would exist if they could account for x y z. There’s no scientific basis to the claim.
The basics of it are that extremes on either end, of being underweight or very overweight, are health risks. The health risk of being “overweight” are massively overstated, because people like to judge and bully fat people.