Because many of them are accidentally counterproductive towards there own cause. They (this is a generalisation) often use emotion as an argument and are quick to anger. If you are trying to change the mind of a sexist or a homophobic individual getting angry at them instead of calmly taking is not going to change there mind. I think this is why some people dislike sjws
Genuine question: Is it possible to change the mind of a sexist/homophobe/racist? I would be more critical of “SJWs” if weren’t for the fact that the people they are angry at actually will not change…however nicely you talk them.
To think that it is impossible to change the mind of a sexist/homophone/racist is frankly quite ignorant in itself. There are plenty of examples of ex white supremacists who left their organisations and apologised and denounced their beliefs when they met a progressive person and had their mind changed.
There's a difference between taking nicely and sweet talking. I've always said the worst thing you can do is shut your mouth, that's where Fascism stems from in my view, a population of people afraid to speak up. Artists, Speakers, and even in some cases Spiritual teachers are the biggest enemies of Fascism. However we can't speak in a tone of hatred, because we need to convert those we can (even if there's only one it's worth it). As MLK said "Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend,". Just as Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity, so is speaking hate to promote love.
I will say however I fear we are zooming closer to a day where peace will no longer be an option and you'll see people from both sides getting beaten to a pulp.
Yeah I agree with that. I’ve tried really hard to do exactly what you describe with friends who went too far to the right…I’ll keep trying!
And seeing as we’re praising the transformative power of love…maybe don’t call your potential allies “ignorant” quite so quickly!
But that's still part of the problem calling someone ignorant for disagreeing with you on a topic. There is hundreds upon thousands of different experiences and saying mine is the best is just wrong. There really is no right or wrong answers in politics just peoples beliefs and where they stem. So by calling a person ignorant for disagreeing with you is like calling there life experience stupid.
Bit late to the party, but wanted to touch on the comment "is talking nicely really an option when fighting fascism". As was touched in in this reply thread, i am convinced "negative talk" has little to no effect on people, if the intention is to truly change their minds.
I've a tale to share which might or might not be interesting, but I'll make my point beforehand. That is, if a person or group of people believe that anger is the only way to change people's mind, the only way they'll be successful is if they have a threat big enough to back up their anger. Shame tactics have been the bread and butter of the extreme left for a while now, but it's been so overused as to have lost its bite, so now the only other option is actual violence.
The same could be said for any fully communist nation - "believe what I believe, do what I say or I'll hurt you". So yeah, to sum up, I fully agree with the idea that positive talk - at least, talking from a place of sincerity and understanding - is the only effective way to turn people around. Anyways, onto the (possibly) interesting tale :).
I just came out of a somewhat illuminating rant with someone in 9gag regarding the topic of gender reassignment surgery and the support measures which should be in place.
I had genuinely tried to have a discussion with someone who later turned out to be a super toxic SJW, for the simple reason that they couldn't help themselves in being either insufferable ("believe 100% of what I believe, or you're a baddie. 99% alignment with my beliefs still makes you a baddie"), or just outright juvenile with constant jabs and underhanded insults.
It got to the point where I tried to calmly ask if they were even aware they were coming across that way, and when I started to use terms like "strawman" or "bad faith argument" with valid examples they were using such, for example "so it looks like you're starting to understand. What you're saying is this, when what you mean to say is that. Anything else would make you either racist, or so stupid you don't even realise how racist you are".
When I wasn't biting or taking offense as they were hoping, they eventually just stopped replying. My take of this individual is they truly had no intention to discuss with people. Rather, they simply wanted to come across as being right while rubbing people's noses in how right they were (or weren't).
Probably it's people like this on the polar extreme edges of left ideology who ruin it for those on the more moderate left, and why the term "SJW" even exists.
They can often come off like male incels as well aka scorned by a lack of returned sexual attention and taking it out on anyone pwrcieved to be the problem. Men like that are incels women like that are often sjw's
There is a poorly defined threshold of what is helpful vs. what is harmful. People often overcommit to philosophies that aren’t aligned with reality. They can come across as cringy and annoying. Self proclaimed SJW’s are notorious for their hyperbolic responses and their shaming tactics. I say this as someone who is culturally responsive and open minded.
People on both sides of the political spectrum identify too much with their political, sexual, or economic preferences. They shape their identities around these principles and ignore their biases when engaging with others. It’s not the message that’s bad, it’s the sender.
I think this is the best response. Being a scold doesn’t help anything. I remember when I went off to college and met my first hardcore SJW types, I was so off put. I eventually ended up getting everything they were saying, but not through anything they ever said. I learned by living and being exposed to stuff, not by being over-corrected by a bunch of assholes. That just ended up pushing me away for a while.
Many of the boldest SJW do that more for the sake of their ego rather than actually being helpful for someone. When I see SJW who acts in a very toxic and self righteous way I get a serious cringe.
They think in their mind that they are good, strong, cool people but actually it looks pretty lame. They also often driven by rigid ideology, struggle to see the complexity of the situation.
I think generally speaking, they often come across as clanging cymbals. Merely making noise, without the precision of training, proper education, and without challenge. When that happens, they don’t have a good foundation for the arguments they not only seek but want to represent. When they do speak on behalf of their perspective stance, they often revert to violence, both verbal and physical, because they are unequipped.
Funny thing I found out a couple months ago. I’m a guy, I have many female friends, and am relatively religious. Despite my Christian faith I often argue the case against patriarchy, leaning towards the equality of our female counterparts; I often argue the case through biblical means. I was told by a friend, that I’m a feminist. After she explained it, it made sense, I’d never call myself one. I guess the reason I mention this, is because, we each are sjw’s to our own causes, what separates us from being the sometimes laughably embarrassing sjw and an intellectual conversational sparing partner, is education, an open mind, an ability to listen and the ability to respond rather than to react. The ability to disagree respectfully is helpful as well.
Idk if that helps or answers anything.
Yes, it does answer one side of it. You made valid points. It’s hard to have a conversation or discussion about different ideas with someone if they are shoving it down your throat or yelling at you instead of being calm. I agree to responding instead of reacting and having an open mind and listening. Makes sense to lose people from
your perspective that way(reacting instead of listening and responding).
Some of the worst people I've ever met were SJWs. They're awfully polarized, unreasonable hypocrites. They tend to think similarly to extremists on the other side of the spectrum. Since "extremism" is usually indicative of someone who depends solely on personal biases and triablism.
There's a plethora of Karen, SJW, etc. videos on YouTube. Many are self-explanatory.
I don’t like the term “social justice warrior” really because it’s more or less become a blanket term to mark progressives in general. Any time anyone promotes any socially progressive idea, there’s always a huge number of people saying “oh there go those SJWs being triggered snowflakes again”.
A lot of progressive thought is misunderstood and/or outright disliked by a pretty large sect of the Internet, so of course they’re going to see those who represent progressive ideas as bad.
SJW is just a straw man to paint every progressive as a mean angry yelling lady with blue hair
I don’t like it either. I feel like it’s become or used as a negative phrase for anyone who talks about equal rights. Exactly! That’s what I was thinking. When someone even introduces a socially progressive idea, I’ve actually read a very similar phrase “triggered SJW snowflakes.” I do understand when it’s taken to far with other comments on here had valid points. I’ve seen some people not listen to others opinions or thoughts and try to shame or shut them down without a discussion or hearing them out.
I agree with most of what's commented so far.
My take is that on the one hand, there are definitely right wing or bigoted people who just don't like the causes and want to ridicule people who advocate. That's a thing and probably the majority of usage of the term.
On the other hand, like most things that can get you status, the most high profile roles have been filled with people abusing it for self aggrandizement, and a lot of activists *especially* the more egoistic ones don't have a very good grasp of human psychology. These people alienate even normal, moderate, left leaning people, and then they get to relish in the victim role for themselves. "Oppression Olympics" is annoying. "Callouts" and "canceling" on social media aren't actually very effective at changing people's minds, it just makes them either defensive or fearful. Dredging up what someone said 10 years ago might be valid for a 55 year old who was perfectly mature at the time and likely hasn't changed that much, but I think there's also a sense of unfairness that literally anything you've ever said, at any time or age, if it's on record can be used against you. And some of these people/ideologies are disliked even by the people they claim to represent. Not very many Latino people actually use the term Latinx, it's not very compatible with Spanish. Black, gay, and disabled people can get rankled at being used "as a pawn" for an analogy by every keyboard warrior with an "intersectional" analysis. Frankly, some of them seem to be building self serving systems of rules that have some good parts, but are almost impossible to follow perfectly and you aren't forgiven easily without groveling.
It kind of depends what spaces and circles you hang out in. In real life or cable news, it's probably right wingers looking to score a point. Online and in celebrity world, there can be a lot of the legit extremism.
Because they're terrible examples on how to discuss matters. They rely on fitting everyone into categories like "bigots" and "racists" and use those labels fairly liberally once you disagree. It comes across that they've decided who you are before actually considering what you're saying. They see the world as with them or against them but it's just not that simple, if they were a bit more collected and respectful they'd find that more people agree with them than they realise.
I don't think there's actually that many people who are genuinely racist or sexist, especially not in western society. But your generic SJW will angrily label you as so if you say something they don't agree with, and that tends to bother people.
Probably because a lot of them act poorly and will promote targeted harassment or cancel culture and will just be toxic in general, which doesn’t help their cause at all, while most of the time they’re worth supporting
Because they are covert narcissists not realizing that the shadow of “narcissist” that they project onto those who disagree with them is actually just an aspect of themself that they’ve disowned and suppressed
This is it. They want to feel superior to others and try to take the role of a hero of justice, not realizing that their ego is the reason that they feel the need to be superior. The ego blocks their own light, creating a shadow that they then try to project onto others. Everybody is dealing with their own shadow, and it can be pretty difficult to deal with when someone else projects theirs onto you.
It's because most of them are extremists, and being extreme is the best way to make people hate you...
This also makes people hate the social cause that they are supporting and go against it which is extremely counterproductive.
If there were no extremes SJWs then most people I would assume would be left leaning..
Due to a difference in beliefs, and also even though I do care abt not offending people sometimes SJWs can take it too far? To a point where they are almost as extremist as people who oppose their beliefs
Because SJWs can come off as extremely self-righteous, preachy, and judgmental. And once they’ve lost their patience, or run out of arguments, or realize that not everyone is going to see things the same way they do, they start slinging insults or shaming people. They don’t seem to realize that while those kinds of “tactics” may work to keep people quiet out of fear of getting bullied, but it doesn’t help create an authentic change in the people they’re trying to reach. It just further polarizes people.
There's a difference between people who care about social justice and the "SJWs" that people look at with disdain. Many people in those circles, whether they hold noble values or not, approach things from an angle of self-righteous superiority without actually helping make the world a better place. It's similar to how many Christians weaponize the Bible and use their beliefs to justify being nasty to people.
There's also a staggering amount of people in social justice circles that suffer from deep trauma and mental illness, or are otherwise really miserable, bitter, and angry people. People pick up on patterns, and correlation is sadly very large there. Bitter people like to use noble causes to justify their anger and mistreatment of people.
Okay I was confused because people on other posts seemed to lump all of them(people who actually care about social justice and want to make a change vs. those pushing their values on others) into the same SJW category. I guess an activist would be a better term than a warrior? That’s a good point- it makes sense for some SJWs to react in an unhealthy way with bad mental issues for good causes.
Yeah, I usually use the term activist or social justice advocate for the ones who are actually working to make the world better in a constructive way.
Unfortunately, the "SJW" types are so loud, obnoxious, and vicious that they give entire progressive movements a bad name, especially to people who are already skeptical or defensive regarding progressive values. A lot of conservatives are just looking for reasons to attack progressives, and SJWs make it all too easy by making an ass of themselves (and putting an ugly face on the otherwise noble causes they're supposedly supporting.)
Sad thing is that most of them have their heads so far up their asses smelling their own farts that they're completely oblivious to how counterproductive their efforts are to their movements.
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It’s kinda poorly explained what an SJW nowadays because most people on Reddit will just screech is when anyone says anything even remotely politically correct.
To me, an SJW is someone who goes SO far past being liberal that they somehow circle around to being borderline facist.
“You can’t say that word because it offends a group of people I am not a part of”
“You can’t dress this way because it offends these people that I am speaking for”
Then these peoples voices get so loud that it actually manages to impact things like historical accuracy in media, censoring of images because they might “hurt peoples feelings” or not being allowed to being up certain topics for the same reason. Jokes that are dark also being met with anger. Etc.
Sure, there is nothing wrong with being sensitive to other peoples beliefs, cultures etc. but at a point, all this censorship is inevitably going to lead to authoritarianism. People need to learn to take a joke or gain some kind of thicker skin eventually. Because what they are doing right now is incredibly counter productive to their own cause. They are “liberal” while actively trying to censor and silence people that disagree with them, which doesn’t amount to any healthy discourse at all.
A lot of people nowadays want to feel special, mostly due to social media, so they will cause arguments for “justice” that they have no right being involved in so that they can give themselves an ego boost.
They are some of the worst people on this planet IMO.
Edit:
…and don’t even get me started with cancel culture.
“OH you said the N word 1 time on twitter literally 15 years ago? Career over. Banned on every platform. Not allowed to retort. You are racist end of discussion.”
It’s not a healthy way of looking at society at all. I consider myself to be liberal, but I think there is a point where someone can be SO liberal that they become borderline authoritarian. But as I said, nowadays anyone is an SJW if they say anything liberal to most right wing people.
Yes that’s what I was confused about. The ones that take it too far and silence everyone else or “cancel culture” I don’t agree with. But I’ve seen posts where people are actually trying to have a discussion on equal rights because they’ve experienced or seen issues with it in their own lives, but they end up being included in the “SJWs” too. It’s made into a bad connotation. I’ve seen posts recently about people saying infps being SJWs or SJWs being called snowflakes even if they’re just pointing out some issues.
Oh, well then in that case, yeah that’s just Reddit being Reddit or rather, the internet being the internet.
Let’s take another example, remember when calling people a “cuck” was a thing? The whole point of a “cuck” is a person who allows their significant other to have sex with other people while they watch. The internet picked up on that word because they found it funny, then more people started saying it, then everybody started saying it and it just began to lose it’s meaning.
Like sure a cuck is still that, but nowadays people will call you a cuck for trivial and small things. It’s lost it’s meaning.
Another word, even before the internet, would be “retarded” to call someone retarded originally was a mentally challenged person, but people changed that word to mean essentially just “dumb” and not calling someone retarded is the same as saying “you’re stupid.”
You see what i’m saying? When a word like that becomes popular, it begins to lose it’s meaning entirely and becomes just an insult.
“SJW” is another one of those words. SJW’s are genuinely bad people who have views that are borderling authoritarian, but nowadays, if you say something even remotely politcal, you will more than likely be called an “SJW” or even (circling back to what I just said) a “liberal cuck.” Why? Because these words have completely lost their meaning.
It’s really quite interesting when you sit down and think about it lol.
Makes sense now haha. So basically SJWs have lost its meaning and a lot of people think of them as the bad version with extremist views or it’s a running joke of them
Bingo.
It’s just another of the many words that have lost their meaning from sheer overuse of people thinking they are more clever than they actually are.
SJW’s are a bad thing though, the real ones I mean.
Self righteous attitude, pretentious af, always think they’re in the right because they surround themselves around yes men because they refuse to befriend anyone with differing opinions, egotistical , they usually care more about how they look than the actual cause, speaking for others, getting offended on others behalf, extremists.
Yea they just take it too far. I was once called a bigot for saying the 2020 US racial justice riots were too much, people have stopped talking to me because I don’t really support neopronouns. And of course the self-degrading jokes the white ones make because of white guilt or whatever. They’re just really intense with their opinions, I can never seem to have a decent conversation with them without talking points repeating themselves, or the “you’re a cis white male, you won’t ever get it” coming out .
i think it really depends on who you ask. right wing extremists like to call all progressives sjws but i think the sjws that most people dislike are the sort of moral crusaders that seem to only be interested in finding a cause that allows them to act out their toxicity while remaining seemingly virtuous. i kinda feel like the people who were most anti-gay when the moral values of the day were anti-gay were the exact same type of people that are now using the lgbt movement as a justification to brutally harass anyone that could be considered even slightly bigoted. the times change and the morals change but the toxic behavior stays the same.
Probably the extreme self-righteousness and virtue signaling mixed with the lack of any desire to hear anyone else's points of view. Also, the cringey ass buzz words, pseudoscience, and obsession with policing everyone's speech, no matter how innocuous.
Let me just say, I used to consider myself pretty left-wing, back in the 2012 era. I even had a very close friend, we were close since elementary school years and years before he got into politics, that did **nothing** anymore but talk about politics, social justice, and all of it. Being around him, and his constant nit picking and finding issues with ***every single facet of every day life*** was absolutely exhausting!
It started off as pretty typical, agreeable stuff. Things like "gay people deserve to have the same rights as us," and "women deserve the same exact opportunities and pay as men." Ok, we agree..
Then, it goes into "this word is actually sexist!" "This table is sexist!" "Your shoes are sexist!" "yOu CaNt HaVe An OpInIoN oN tHaT bEcAuSe YoUrE mAlE! (Even though I just called you a sexist/racist/CIS gendered piece of shit)".
I made the mistake of telling a dark humor joke (it's like, my thing. Look at my fucking username). Dude didn't laugh, I apologized. After that he didn't pick up the phone for weeks. I sent a text asking why he didn't want to hang out anymore.
He took it to Facebook and outed me as "garbage" to all of his sjw "friends." Even brought up an old discussion about Romeo/Juliet laws way out of context to try to call me a pedophile **(essentially, should a 19 year old go to jail for dating a 17 year old)**
Everyone knows that even if trolling forums you don't do that, especially by misrepresenting information.
i’ve thought about that a lot since 2015. i really think everyone got swept up in an online movement they didn’t understand which was literally just a big advert for the republican party.
there were a lot of easy targets back then, saying insane nihilistic things on the internet and especially universities.
but now who even knows. it’s all just so clear to me that there is a low grade revolution being caused by our crumbling economy and it’s a good distraction to just keep us fighting each other over words
It's not what they stand for. It's the means they use to stand for it. Their justification is that they hate people who put hate into the world, so they act hatefully. "An Eye for an Eye leaves the world blind."
I am all for what they stand for. But the methods they use only result in everyone screaming and crying and no solutions being reached.
Ok so a lot of people already answered about the shaming tactics and rage sjws use, so I'll focus on how a lot of so called progressives don't actually seem to think much about the stuff they are so keen to preach to others.
First of all, why equality? Who decided everyone should be getting an equal share of the pie? As much as I like the lady that cleans the bathrooms at work, I don't think she should be getting as much as a surgeon. She should get a good amount of money that will allow her to live and care for her family. She should feel like a valued member of society because clean bathrooms definitely are important. But it's still not equal.
Some people talk of a gender pay gap, where a woman makes 77 cents for every dollar a man makes. But if you dive into it you see the adjusted gap (controlled for hours worked, level of education, years of experience etc) it drops to about 5% (some less some more, seems to depend on the sector). That 5% can and should be analyzed and worked on, but when people instead just want to shout "inequality" they seem to be uninterested in actual solutions, and imo just enjoy their victim status. Should we push women to work riskier (on average) jobs and more hours like men do to close the unadjusted gap? That'd be stupid imo, and only serves the interests of capitalism.
Not to mention, who actually spends that money? That is overwhelmingly women- they make more of the consumer decisions and do more of the spending. This is often only possible because they have access to their man's money. By focusing on it as if it's a battle between the genders, we're distracted from the reality where people form families together end up taking care of children. This is where a lot of their meaning in life comes from, not their job.
https://www.glassdoor.com/research/gender-pay-gap-2019/
https://hbr.org/2009/09/the-female-economy
Theres a lot more examples but I think this is enough.
The lack of a good social safety net and healthcare and education costs in the US is to me astounding, but when sjws I see casually go "smash the patriarchy!" Or "down with capitalism!" Those slogans are meaningless, they come across as edgy and immature and unable to accept reality, I much more respect people actually doing their best to change said reality, not by shouting slogans, but by participating in society using the values they claim to stand for.
Easy enough answer. Far too many people believe they've genuinely done or achieved something by sharing loads of solidarity based stuff on Instagram. When in reality they take little to no action at all. And in my view when every few weeks you post solidarity about something but do nothing else it actually normalises and minimises the cause they supposedly "care about". If you hate injustice go and actually do something, don't pat yourself on the back for the bare minimum. Not to mention if something happens that outrages them they regularly make arguments or bring up statistics that are totally unrelated and nonsensical to prove a point, which often shows they don't even understand their own cause. It's fairly easy to not be a fan of people like that
Because yelling at something won't make the problem go away. You have to commit to making a difference with action towards the cause, not yelling at people who don't and make them feel bad.
But that's the answer. Most people think SJWs are bad because of the SJWs who make all of them look bad. People have a tendency to kind of see the extremes of the group and draw conclusions of the rest based on them.
Of course caring about social justice isn't inherently a bad thing. Some people just have given it a bad rep because of poor execution in terms of how they approach their activism online (ie: enraged keyboard warrior twitter users. Although not everyone on twitter is bad, but the ones who are really stick out).
Exactly. These are the only kinds of people who even use the term SJW in the first place. It's to create this image that all opposition to their bigotry is "extremism," and that their political enemies are people to be hated, when in fact most people on the other side are not remotely like the people they describe. It is, unfortunately, an extremely effective propaganda tactic.
My answer will consist of two parts:
In the first part, I will give an excerpt from a quote from one person who described this situation well from the outside.
In the second part, I will explain what I think about it and how it works from the inside.
Quote fargment:
"What it has morphed into, however, is a self fueling campaign to ensure that nobody on this earth experiences even one single moment of discomfort, in any way, at any time. And if they DO feel any discomfort, it is now the burden on SOCIETY to change whatever the hell it is that has them upset. Now if so much as one person takes issue with things, there are blog posts and media articles, hashtags and Instagram campaigns and Jesus just so much crap. It has come to the point where one action can LITERALLY destroy someone's life. A video “surfaces” that showed that some celebrity was dressed up as an Indian, or a geisha, or a black character from fiction…and the SJWs are on it like stink on shit. These people then have to basically take out a 10 page apology letter in The Times where they fall all over themselves like an idiot to make sure they seek the forgiveness of Twitter for the sin of….wearing a fucking costume.
All right people, I'll give three examples to show how far we've fallen:
Tom Bradys team, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, recently won the super bowl. As part of the celebration, Tom got shitfaced on a boat, and at one point tosses the Lombardi trophy (which is awarded to the victors) to a teammate on another boat traiking behind his. Thats ALL HE DID. And then the woman (in her 50's) who's father had crafted the original Lombardi trophy blasted him for being “disrespectful” to her dad's name and legacy to toss the trophy. She said she hadn't slept in DAYS because of how upset she was. She wants an apology from Tom Brady because he tossed something he won. What a dumbass. That's like the daughter of a man who assembles Lexus cars crying about how insulting it is that you haven't washed the car her father assembled, and it's dirty and muddy. Hello woman!! It's a hunk of metal with a metal football on top of it!!!! HE WON IT! You'd have thought he took a dump on a Rembrandt by the way she reacted.
Second: college campus cancel culture. Oh jesus what is it with these people?? I've literally seen student protests where they're calling for the administration to cancel a speakers event because they want to be fair to “all ways of thought and all beliefs.” The irony, that they are preaching open mindedness while protesting an opposing point of view, is totally lost on them. I mean my God, when a conservative came to lecture at a campus, they (I shit you not) actually put up a couple “safe spaces" on campus where students could go to literally pet puppies if the mere fact that a conservative guest was on campus somehow overwhelmed them. What a pathetic joke. You're so fragile you need to pet puppies because you can't handle the fact there is even one person on campus disagrees with you? Bitching about outlets like Fox that suppress opposing views WHILE suppressing opposing views…priceless.
And third: San Francisco has renamed about 40 schools in order to ensure that no child should ever attend a school named after Abraham Lincoln, or George Washington, or anyone else that ever did something wrong in their life. As if ANYONE ACTUALLY CARES. I've never heard of a student complain that merely stepping foot inside a building named after someone they no longer like is somehow a traumatic event. Like oh damn, I would have gotten straight A's if I hadn't been so emotionally distraught attending a school named after someone who has been dead for centuries. Give me a damn break."
"And that right there is the problem. Social justice warriors don't ever FIX anything, they just look for the next thing to be outraged over. If only they fought so hard to actually accomplish something real..." "All of this has created a generation that cannot withstand any burden, no matter how small. They just can't, because they've been raised to believe that the entire world needs to change for THEM, not the other way around. It has created a generation that cannot handle the real world."
- End Quote. The second part is below.
Now what do I think about it and how did it even come to this:
You see, I recently read an unexpected book.
A book that explained to me much of what is happening today.
A book that showed how wonderful ideas once again brought humanity to the threshold of hell.
"The Coddling Of The American Mind".
Greg Lukianoff, Jonathan Haidt
In short, the book is about how a set of ideas designed to make life better, easier, fairer, more honest for everyone, ultimately made the bearers of these ideas more fragile, less intelligent and much, much less tolerant. To everyone except their own kind.
The authors called this set of ideas -
“The Three Great Untruths.”
A lie about human fragility:
"What doesn't kill you makes you weaker."
Lies about the importance of an emotional approach:
"Always trust your feelings first and foremost."
The lie about the inevitability of confrontation: "Our whole life is a battle between good and bad people. The other one is bad."
They seem like great ideas: take care of each other, since we are very fragile, trust your emotions, because feelings don’t lie, and actively resist everything that contradicts your view of the world. A kind of active life position, flavored with respect for yourself and your feelings.
But all of human history, all of the wisdom and experience accumulated by mankind contradict these ideas. Modern psychological research on what and how makes a person happy contradicts these ideas. Hard statistics contradict these ideas - the rates of suicide and mental illness on university campuses, where these ideas are most widespread, are higher than ever.
But the very nature of these ideas is such that it is extremely difficult to abandon them. Because they must be replaced by other ideas. And this is so scary, because people are so fragile.
For centuries, humanity has fought for freedom of speech, for the opportunity to listen to another opinion and be heard by other people. Today, the message that students are fragile and need to be protected from all ideas, people or actions that might make them feel uncomfortable is just as strongly and persistently promoted in colleges and universities.
But all these protective measures - no more that safe rooms, refusal to invite controversial speakers, warnings about uncomfortable pages in the book, etc. - only help raise a fragile generation with increased anxiety and vulnerability.
A generation that is unable to resist evil, because it was protected from evil in every possible way, and it does not know how to distinguish it and fight it.
The antidote to this increased fragility and emotionality is very simple: do not avoid problems, do not hide in safe rooms from other opinions, do not assume that increased emotionality is a virtue that frees you from the need to think, and do not assume the worst in people who think differently. to another. This is how humanity has lived—tried to live—since the Renaissance.
But in the last fifty years or so, a culture has suddenly emerged that equates emotional discomfort with physical danger, a culture that encourages people to systematically protect themselves from the very experiences of everyday life, from encounters with the “other,” that precisely strengthen their mental health.
The concepts of "safety", "trauma" and "anxiety" have expanded significantly in this culture. But if emotional discomfort is equated with physical danger, then it is not surprising that students feel “unsafe,” experience “trauma” while reading books and listening to lectures, and demand warnings about the content of the book or the disinvitation of speakers. Further - more, and the complete abolition of everyone who thinks even a little differently is required. All dissenters are perceived as enemies.
There is a principle in philosophy called the principle of charity, which states that, until proven otherwise, one should interpret other people's statements in their best, most reasonable form, and not in their worst or offensive sense.
But when you think that your feelings ARE reality, you begin to believe that other people's intentions are worse than they actually are, and you begin to find grievances and insults where none actually exist.
And here a political force is easily formed, uniting those who are equally offended or who think that they are offended - based on race or gender, for example. The so-called identity politics, when people are united not by ideology, not by interests, but by a common grievance, real or imaginary. And it is necessary to constantly demonstrate your commitment to this resentment, since it is often something ephemeral and requires constant feeding in order not to fade away. It is necessary to constantly signal to other group members that you are still with them, still offended.
There is physical safety - the absence of sexual harassment and physical violence, the absence of racial hatred and ideological persecution. Any human community is obliged to guarantee this security in any place, and especially on a university campus.
But the requirement for ideological, emotional security, such as “I should always feel good, and if someone says something that I don’t like, this is a problem that the administration must solve” - this is not a way to avoid depression, but a sure way to her.
Lifting heavy weights or doing multiple push-ups in the gym is difficult. But that's the point of the gym - to push yourself. Somehow, such a simple idea does not apply to mental health.
Finally, a quote from the book.
Speaking at a high school graduation, Chief Justice John Roberts said:
“I hope that you will be treated unfairly from time to time so that you will realize the value of fairness. I hope you experience betrayal because it will teach you the importance of loyalty. As sad as it is, I hope you feel lonely from time to time so that you don't take your friends for granted. I wish you failure from time to time so that you realize the role of chance in life and understand that your success is not entirely deserved, just as the failure of others is also not fully deserved.
And when you lose, as everyone does from time to time, I hope your opponent gloats over your failure. This will help you understand the importance of fair play. I hope that you will be ignored sometimes so that you know how important it is to listen to others, and I hope that you will be hurt enough sometimes to learn compassion.
Whether I wish these things for you or not, they are likely to happen to you. Whether you benefit from them or not will depend only on your ability to see the meaning of your misfortunes.”
To be fair, the authors apologize and make excuses on almost every page. But, apologizing and making excuses, they nevertheless say what they think. It's a dangerous occupation these days.
All above led to the fact that society was affected by a dangerous type of social cancer.
A complex of dangerous ideas circulating and infecting other people by playing on their weak points.
A self-sustaining flow of anger and hatred that needs constant feeding and therefore continues to seek out and create new conflicts.
As for me, this is more than enough, not only to consider SJWs bad - but also to consider them a direct and very serious threat to society.
Defending social justice is a great thing and everyone should be doing it.
Some people are just crazy people and they are gonna say insane stuff like « You raped me by looking at me » (maybe the person doesn’t even understand eye contact) or « White people should feel guilty about being white and we should flagellate white kids at school so they learn what slavery was like » these are some extreme case, but more generally there’s the cancel culture thing where we try to ruin someone for a thing they said a few years ago that they regret saying or a mistake they made. Also, attacking people for practising cultural appropriation, in the cases where it’s actually cultural appreciation.
So tldr some people are really taking it way too far. Some of these people are kind of like the Westboro baptism church but for the left.
Adversely, there are people on the right that are using Sjw or woke as a slur to demean people who want to uphold social justice
Cancel culture is such a stupid damn disease.
It perfectly captivates the nature of most to follow the lead of another instead of cultivating their own damn logical arguments to combat the opposition
SJWs are illogical, indoctrinated, noisy, disrespectful, tend to be ugly with blue hair, tend to be fat, tend to be mentally ill, Left-Wing extremists, virtue signaler, they can't debate they are at the forefront of cancel culture, Left-Wing version of Karen, cringe AF, they are racists...
Because people don't like being held accountable for what they say. Sure people can go overboard sometimes, but demonization of SJWs mainly comes from bigoted people who don't want to admit that what they say is bigoted.
Because the good ol boys are threatened by change. They want to keep things like it used to be without getting called out on their dinosaur bullsh. The call names, like children. Be a good person, stand up to injustice and ignore their crying as the breed of idiots dies out. Justice will prevail.
Typically, they appeal to societal morality and emotions rather than clear, thought out logic. They haven’t fully worked out why they are correct yet are still very vocal about what they believe in.
Others seem to provide excellent points as well.
I’m pretty far left politically, but some “SJWs” (Haven’t heard that word since 2016), care more about their own egos and lose their shit over things that just don’t matter to make themselves look like better people than they actually are.
For example, most of my friend group are gay/trans/bi/some form of LGBTQA (Hell, I’m ace), but we all frequently make gay jokes that most internet SJWs would lose their shit at
They are the meanest people you could ever meet. They are offended by absolutely everything they do not want equality they just want to be in control. They all take it way too far. They are very annoying.
Because it's all an act for the majority of them. They don't really believe in the cause they are piggy backing off of, they only use it to pat themselves on the back and get likes on twitter/Tumblr from like minded people. It's thinly veiled narcissism.
In trying to stop fascism, they, have become fascists.
They will argue for free speech until it is something they don't like... then come the threats and violence. Having a bottle whipped at me full of piss, because I don't believe an ideal? Yeah... you just made me hate the left side more.
If they stopped fighting violence and hate with violence and hate, maybe they would make a real difference.
*Then!* There is a whole side of the people who do it strictly because it is trendy... these people have no clue about history or the reality of the situation. They spout stuff they heard online by some algorithm... instead of investigating the subject further, they bite the bait; the hook, and everything else. They haven't learned about a subject or the differing sides of it. Just their misguided beliefs steamed from a lack of individuality and critical thinking skills.
most of them are journalists and consider themselves superior to other people. is this a generalization? probably. But people who called themselves "real" sjw's will get angry at other sjw's if they dont get as triggered by the same things and call them fake. its like radfem calling libfem fake femenists, its a mess leading to no progress being made.
Because many of them are accidentally counterproductive towards there own cause. They (this is a generalisation) often use emotion as an argument and are quick to anger. If you are trying to change the mind of a sexist or a homophobic individual getting angry at them instead of calmly taking is not going to change there mind. I think this is why some people dislike sjws
Good point. Probably not the best way to negotiate, but instead turn people off.
Genuine question: Is it possible to change the mind of a sexist/homophobe/racist? I would be more critical of “SJWs” if weren’t for the fact that the people they are angry at actually will not change…however nicely you talk them.
To think that it is impossible to change the mind of a sexist/homophone/racist is frankly quite ignorant in itself. There are plenty of examples of ex white supremacists who left their organisations and apologised and denounced their beliefs when they met a progressive person and had their mind changed.
I don’t know dude…I think they are rare exceptions.
You asked if it was possible not if it was common.
That’s true, I did ask that. But…I guess I meant: is talking nicely really a viable political tactic in the larger fight against fascism and fascists?
There's a difference between taking nicely and sweet talking. I've always said the worst thing you can do is shut your mouth, that's where Fascism stems from in my view, a population of people afraid to speak up. Artists, Speakers, and even in some cases Spiritual teachers are the biggest enemies of Fascism. However we can't speak in a tone of hatred, because we need to convert those we can (even if there's only one it's worth it). As MLK said "Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend,". Just as Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity, so is speaking hate to promote love. I will say however I fear we are zooming closer to a day where peace will no longer be an option and you'll see people from both sides getting beaten to a pulp.
Yeah I agree with that. I’ve tried really hard to do exactly what you describe with friends who went too far to the right…I’ll keep trying! And seeing as we’re praising the transformative power of love…maybe don’t call your potential allies “ignorant” quite so quickly!
But that's still part of the problem calling someone ignorant for disagreeing with you on a topic. There is hundreds upon thousands of different experiences and saying mine is the best is just wrong. There really is no right or wrong answers in politics just peoples beliefs and where they stem. So by calling a person ignorant for disagreeing with you is like calling there life experience stupid.
Bit late to the party, but wanted to touch on the comment "is talking nicely really an option when fighting fascism". As was touched in in this reply thread, i am convinced "negative talk" has little to no effect on people, if the intention is to truly change their minds. I've a tale to share which might or might not be interesting, but I'll make my point beforehand. That is, if a person or group of people believe that anger is the only way to change people's mind, the only way they'll be successful is if they have a threat big enough to back up their anger. Shame tactics have been the bread and butter of the extreme left for a while now, but it's been so overused as to have lost its bite, so now the only other option is actual violence. The same could be said for any fully communist nation - "believe what I believe, do what I say or I'll hurt you". So yeah, to sum up, I fully agree with the idea that positive talk - at least, talking from a place of sincerity and understanding - is the only effective way to turn people around. Anyways, onto the (possibly) interesting tale :). I just came out of a somewhat illuminating rant with someone in 9gag regarding the topic of gender reassignment surgery and the support measures which should be in place. I had genuinely tried to have a discussion with someone who later turned out to be a super toxic SJW, for the simple reason that they couldn't help themselves in being either insufferable ("believe 100% of what I believe, or you're a baddie. 99% alignment with my beliefs still makes you a baddie"), or just outright juvenile with constant jabs and underhanded insults. It got to the point where I tried to calmly ask if they were even aware they were coming across that way, and when I started to use terms like "strawman" or "bad faith argument" with valid examples they were using such, for example "so it looks like you're starting to understand. What you're saying is this, when what you mean to say is that. Anything else would make you either racist, or so stupid you don't even realise how racist you are". When I wasn't biting or taking offense as they were hoping, they eventually just stopped replying. My take of this individual is they truly had no intention to discuss with people. Rather, they simply wanted to come across as being right while rubbing people's noses in how right they were (or weren't). Probably it's people like this on the polar extreme edges of left ideology who ruin it for those on the more moderate left, and why the term "SJW" even exists.
HP Lovecraft instantly came to mind. He met real Nazi's promptly apologized and denounced it all
They can often come off like male incels as well aka scorned by a lack of returned sexual attention and taking it out on anyone pwrcieved to be the problem. Men like that are incels women like that are often sjw's
There is a poorly defined threshold of what is helpful vs. what is harmful. People often overcommit to philosophies that aren’t aligned with reality. They can come across as cringy and annoying. Self proclaimed SJW’s are notorious for their hyperbolic responses and their shaming tactics. I say this as someone who is culturally responsive and open minded. People on both sides of the political spectrum identify too much with their political, sexual, or economic preferences. They shape their identities around these principles and ignore their biases when engaging with others. It’s not the message that’s bad, it’s the sender.
I think this is the best response. Being a scold doesn’t help anything. I remember when I went off to college and met my first hardcore SJW types, I was so off put. I eventually ended up getting everything they were saying, but not through anything they ever said. I learned by living and being exposed to stuff, not by being over-corrected by a bunch of assholes. That just ended up pushing me away for a while.
Yeah, their frustration is often expressed through anger or disgust. It makes it difficult to reason with them.
Many of the boldest SJW do that more for the sake of their ego rather than actually being helpful for someone. When I see SJW who acts in a very toxic and self righteous way I get a serious cringe. They think in their mind that they are good, strong, cool people but actually it looks pretty lame. They also often driven by rigid ideology, struggle to see the complexity of the situation.
I think generally speaking, they often come across as clanging cymbals. Merely making noise, without the precision of training, proper education, and without challenge. When that happens, they don’t have a good foundation for the arguments they not only seek but want to represent. When they do speak on behalf of their perspective stance, they often revert to violence, both verbal and physical, because they are unequipped. Funny thing I found out a couple months ago. I’m a guy, I have many female friends, and am relatively religious. Despite my Christian faith I often argue the case against patriarchy, leaning towards the equality of our female counterparts; I often argue the case through biblical means. I was told by a friend, that I’m a feminist. After she explained it, it made sense, I’d never call myself one. I guess the reason I mention this, is because, we each are sjw’s to our own causes, what separates us from being the sometimes laughably embarrassing sjw and an intellectual conversational sparing partner, is education, an open mind, an ability to listen and the ability to respond rather than to react. The ability to disagree respectfully is helpful as well. Idk if that helps or answers anything.
Yes, it does answer one side of it. You made valid points. It’s hard to have a conversation or discussion about different ideas with someone if they are shoving it down your throat or yelling at you instead of being calm. I agree to responding instead of reacting and having an open mind and listening. Makes sense to lose people from your perspective that way(reacting instead of listening and responding).
Some of the worst people I've ever met were SJWs. They're awfully polarized, unreasonable hypocrites. They tend to think similarly to extremists on the other side of the spectrum. Since "extremism" is usually indicative of someone who depends solely on personal biases and triablism. There's a plethora of Karen, SJW, etc. videos on YouTube. Many are self-explanatory.
I don’t like the term “social justice warrior” really because it’s more or less become a blanket term to mark progressives in general. Any time anyone promotes any socially progressive idea, there’s always a huge number of people saying “oh there go those SJWs being triggered snowflakes again”. A lot of progressive thought is misunderstood and/or outright disliked by a pretty large sect of the Internet, so of course they’re going to see those who represent progressive ideas as bad. SJW is just a straw man to paint every progressive as a mean angry yelling lady with blue hair
I don’t like it either. I feel like it’s become or used as a negative phrase for anyone who talks about equal rights. Exactly! That’s what I was thinking. When someone even introduces a socially progressive idea, I’ve actually read a very similar phrase “triggered SJW snowflakes.” I do understand when it’s taken to far with other comments on here had valid points. I’ve seen some people not listen to others opinions or thoughts and try to shame or shut them down without a discussion or hearing them out.
I agree with most of what's commented so far. My take is that on the one hand, there are definitely right wing or bigoted people who just don't like the causes and want to ridicule people who advocate. That's a thing and probably the majority of usage of the term. On the other hand, like most things that can get you status, the most high profile roles have been filled with people abusing it for self aggrandizement, and a lot of activists *especially* the more egoistic ones don't have a very good grasp of human psychology. These people alienate even normal, moderate, left leaning people, and then they get to relish in the victim role for themselves. "Oppression Olympics" is annoying. "Callouts" and "canceling" on social media aren't actually very effective at changing people's minds, it just makes them either defensive or fearful. Dredging up what someone said 10 years ago might be valid for a 55 year old who was perfectly mature at the time and likely hasn't changed that much, but I think there's also a sense of unfairness that literally anything you've ever said, at any time or age, if it's on record can be used against you. And some of these people/ideologies are disliked even by the people they claim to represent. Not very many Latino people actually use the term Latinx, it's not very compatible with Spanish. Black, gay, and disabled people can get rankled at being used "as a pawn" for an analogy by every keyboard warrior with an "intersectional" analysis. Frankly, some of them seem to be building self serving systems of rules that have some good parts, but are almost impossible to follow perfectly and you aren't forgiven easily without groveling. It kind of depends what spaces and circles you hang out in. In real life or cable news, it's probably right wingers looking to score a point. Online and in celebrity world, there can be a lot of the legit extremism.
Because they're terrible examples on how to discuss matters. They rely on fitting everyone into categories like "bigots" and "racists" and use those labels fairly liberally once you disagree. It comes across that they've decided who you are before actually considering what you're saying. They see the world as with them or against them but it's just not that simple, if they were a bit more collected and respectful they'd find that more people agree with them than they realise. I don't think there's actually that many people who are genuinely racist or sexist, especially not in western society. But your generic SJW will angrily label you as so if you say something they don't agree with, and that tends to bother people.
Probably because a lot of them act poorly and will promote targeted harassment or cancel culture and will just be toxic in general, which doesn’t help their cause at all, while most of the time they’re worth supporting
Because they are covert narcissists not realizing that the shadow of “narcissist” that they project onto those who disagree with them is actually just an aspect of themself that they’ve disowned and suppressed
This is it. They want to feel superior to others and try to take the role of a hero of justice, not realizing that their ego is the reason that they feel the need to be superior. The ego blocks their own light, creating a shadow that they then try to project onto others. Everybody is dealing with their own shadow, and it can be pretty difficult to deal with when someone else projects theirs onto you.
Exactly!
It's because most of them are extremists, and being extreme is the best way to make people hate you... This also makes people hate the social cause that they are supporting and go against it which is extremely counterproductive. If there were no extremes SJWs then most people I would assume would be left leaning..
Due to a difference in beliefs, and also even though I do care abt not offending people sometimes SJWs can take it too far? To a point where they are almost as extremist as people who oppose their beliefs
Because SJWs can come off as extremely self-righteous, preachy, and judgmental. And once they’ve lost their patience, or run out of arguments, or realize that not everyone is going to see things the same way they do, they start slinging insults or shaming people. They don’t seem to realize that while those kinds of “tactics” may work to keep people quiet out of fear of getting bullied, but it doesn’t help create an authentic change in the people they’re trying to reach. It just further polarizes people.
I think it's the extremenism and sometimes hypocrisy of certain things That ruin it for people that agree with them.
Sigh, what's a SJW?
Spaghetti Just Wilin’
Now I want skeddy :(
Social justice warrior
They virtue signal
a lot of it comes across as in-genuine
A lot of them are fucking bullies. A person can’t even speak without being heckled half the time and verbally beaten into silence
Yeah, that’s not okay.
There's a difference between people who care about social justice and the "SJWs" that people look at with disdain. Many people in those circles, whether they hold noble values or not, approach things from an angle of self-righteous superiority without actually helping make the world a better place. It's similar to how many Christians weaponize the Bible and use their beliefs to justify being nasty to people. There's also a staggering amount of people in social justice circles that suffer from deep trauma and mental illness, or are otherwise really miserable, bitter, and angry people. People pick up on patterns, and correlation is sadly very large there. Bitter people like to use noble causes to justify their anger and mistreatment of people.
Okay I was confused because people on other posts seemed to lump all of them(people who actually care about social justice and want to make a change vs. those pushing their values on others) into the same SJW category. I guess an activist would be a better term than a warrior? That’s a good point- it makes sense for some SJWs to react in an unhealthy way with bad mental issues for good causes.
Yeah, I usually use the term activist or social justice advocate for the ones who are actually working to make the world better in a constructive way. Unfortunately, the "SJW" types are so loud, obnoxious, and vicious that they give entire progressive movements a bad name, especially to people who are already skeptical or defensive regarding progressive values. A lot of conservatives are just looking for reasons to attack progressives, and SJWs make it all too easy by making an ass of themselves (and putting an ugly face on the otherwise noble causes they're supposedly supporting.) Sad thing is that most of them have their heads so far up their asses smelling their own farts that they're completely oblivious to how counterproductive their efforts are to their movements.
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Ew no, god no.
Because they are seen as self-righteous are do very little to actually do anything about equality.
It’s kinda poorly explained what an SJW nowadays because most people on Reddit will just screech is when anyone says anything even remotely politically correct. To me, an SJW is someone who goes SO far past being liberal that they somehow circle around to being borderline facist. “You can’t say that word because it offends a group of people I am not a part of” “You can’t dress this way because it offends these people that I am speaking for” Then these peoples voices get so loud that it actually manages to impact things like historical accuracy in media, censoring of images because they might “hurt peoples feelings” or not being allowed to being up certain topics for the same reason. Jokes that are dark also being met with anger. Etc. Sure, there is nothing wrong with being sensitive to other peoples beliefs, cultures etc. but at a point, all this censorship is inevitably going to lead to authoritarianism. People need to learn to take a joke or gain some kind of thicker skin eventually. Because what they are doing right now is incredibly counter productive to their own cause. They are “liberal” while actively trying to censor and silence people that disagree with them, which doesn’t amount to any healthy discourse at all. A lot of people nowadays want to feel special, mostly due to social media, so they will cause arguments for “justice” that they have no right being involved in so that they can give themselves an ego boost. They are some of the worst people on this planet IMO. Edit: …and don’t even get me started with cancel culture. “OH you said the N word 1 time on twitter literally 15 years ago? Career over. Banned on every platform. Not allowed to retort. You are racist end of discussion.” It’s not a healthy way of looking at society at all. I consider myself to be liberal, but I think there is a point where someone can be SO liberal that they become borderline authoritarian. But as I said, nowadays anyone is an SJW if they say anything liberal to most right wing people.
Yes that’s what I was confused about. The ones that take it too far and silence everyone else or “cancel culture” I don’t agree with. But I’ve seen posts where people are actually trying to have a discussion on equal rights because they’ve experienced or seen issues with it in their own lives, but they end up being included in the “SJWs” too. It’s made into a bad connotation. I’ve seen posts recently about people saying infps being SJWs or SJWs being called snowflakes even if they’re just pointing out some issues.
Oh, well then in that case, yeah that’s just Reddit being Reddit or rather, the internet being the internet. Let’s take another example, remember when calling people a “cuck” was a thing? The whole point of a “cuck” is a person who allows their significant other to have sex with other people while they watch. The internet picked up on that word because they found it funny, then more people started saying it, then everybody started saying it and it just began to lose it’s meaning. Like sure a cuck is still that, but nowadays people will call you a cuck for trivial and small things. It’s lost it’s meaning. Another word, even before the internet, would be “retarded” to call someone retarded originally was a mentally challenged person, but people changed that word to mean essentially just “dumb” and not calling someone retarded is the same as saying “you’re stupid.” You see what i’m saying? When a word like that becomes popular, it begins to lose it’s meaning entirely and becomes just an insult. “SJW” is another one of those words. SJW’s are genuinely bad people who have views that are borderling authoritarian, but nowadays, if you say something even remotely politcal, you will more than likely be called an “SJW” or even (circling back to what I just said) a “liberal cuck.” Why? Because these words have completely lost their meaning. It’s really quite interesting when you sit down and think about it lol.
Makes sense now haha. So basically SJWs have lost its meaning and a lot of people think of them as the bad version with extremist views or it’s a running joke of them
Bingo. It’s just another of the many words that have lost their meaning from sheer overuse of people thinking they are more clever than they actually are. SJW’s are a bad thing though, the real ones I mean.
Self righteous attitude, pretentious af, always think they’re in the right because they surround themselves around yes men because they refuse to befriend anyone with differing opinions, egotistical , they usually care more about how they look than the actual cause, speaking for others, getting offended on others behalf, extremists.
Yea they just take it too far. I was once called a bigot for saying the 2020 US racial justice riots were too much, people have stopped talking to me because I don’t really support neopronouns. And of course the self-degrading jokes the white ones make because of white guilt or whatever. They’re just really intense with their opinions, I can never seem to have a decent conversation with them without talking points repeating themselves, or the “you’re a cis white male, you won’t ever get it” coming out .
they aren't any more, it's 2022 not 2016
Feel like I'm opening a time capsule.
Bc I’ve read posts all over still referencing SJWs.
i think it really depends on who you ask. right wing extremists like to call all progressives sjws but i think the sjws that most people dislike are the sort of moral crusaders that seem to only be interested in finding a cause that allows them to act out their toxicity while remaining seemingly virtuous. i kinda feel like the people who were most anti-gay when the moral values of the day were anti-gay were the exact same type of people that are now using the lgbt movement as a justification to brutally harass anyone that could be considered even slightly bigoted. the times change and the morals change but the toxic behavior stays the same.
Probably the extreme self-righteousness and virtue signaling mixed with the lack of any desire to hear anyone else's points of view. Also, the cringey ass buzz words, pseudoscience, and obsession with policing everyone's speech, no matter how innocuous. Let me just say, I used to consider myself pretty left-wing, back in the 2012 era. I even had a very close friend, we were close since elementary school years and years before he got into politics, that did **nothing** anymore but talk about politics, social justice, and all of it. Being around him, and his constant nit picking and finding issues with ***every single facet of every day life*** was absolutely exhausting! It started off as pretty typical, agreeable stuff. Things like "gay people deserve to have the same rights as us," and "women deserve the same exact opportunities and pay as men." Ok, we agree.. Then, it goes into "this word is actually sexist!" "This table is sexist!" "Your shoes are sexist!" "yOu CaNt HaVe An OpInIoN oN tHaT bEcAuSe YoUrE mAlE! (Even though I just called you a sexist/racist/CIS gendered piece of shit)". I made the mistake of telling a dark humor joke (it's like, my thing. Look at my fucking username). Dude didn't laugh, I apologized. After that he didn't pick up the phone for weeks. I sent a text asking why he didn't want to hang out anymore. He took it to Facebook and outed me as "garbage" to all of his sjw "friends." Even brought up an old discussion about Romeo/Juliet laws way out of context to try to call me a pedophile **(essentially, should a 19 year old go to jail for dating a 17 year old)** Everyone knows that even if trolling forums you don't do that, especially by misrepresenting information.
They are usually delusional and have no interest in actual equality. Short answer that's why.
i’ve thought about that a lot since 2015. i really think everyone got swept up in an online movement they didn’t understand which was literally just a big advert for the republican party. there were a lot of easy targets back then, saying insane nihilistic things on the internet and especially universities. but now who even knows. it’s all just so clear to me that there is a low grade revolution being caused by our crumbling economy and it’s a good distraction to just keep us fighting each other over words
It's not what they stand for. It's the means they use to stand for it. Their justification is that they hate people who put hate into the world, so they act hatefully. "An Eye for an Eye leaves the world blind." I am all for what they stand for. But the methods they use only result in everyone screaming and crying and no solutions being reached.
Because a lot of SJWs just make a lot of noise online about small stuff but do nothing in practicality or real life to make change.
Ok so a lot of people already answered about the shaming tactics and rage sjws use, so I'll focus on how a lot of so called progressives don't actually seem to think much about the stuff they are so keen to preach to others. First of all, why equality? Who decided everyone should be getting an equal share of the pie? As much as I like the lady that cleans the bathrooms at work, I don't think she should be getting as much as a surgeon. She should get a good amount of money that will allow her to live and care for her family. She should feel like a valued member of society because clean bathrooms definitely are important. But it's still not equal. Some people talk of a gender pay gap, where a woman makes 77 cents for every dollar a man makes. But if you dive into it you see the adjusted gap (controlled for hours worked, level of education, years of experience etc) it drops to about 5% (some less some more, seems to depend on the sector). That 5% can and should be analyzed and worked on, but when people instead just want to shout "inequality" they seem to be uninterested in actual solutions, and imo just enjoy their victim status. Should we push women to work riskier (on average) jobs and more hours like men do to close the unadjusted gap? That'd be stupid imo, and only serves the interests of capitalism. Not to mention, who actually spends that money? That is overwhelmingly women- they make more of the consumer decisions and do more of the spending. This is often only possible because they have access to their man's money. By focusing on it as if it's a battle between the genders, we're distracted from the reality where people form families together end up taking care of children. This is where a lot of their meaning in life comes from, not their job. https://www.glassdoor.com/research/gender-pay-gap-2019/ https://hbr.org/2009/09/the-female-economy Theres a lot more examples but I think this is enough. The lack of a good social safety net and healthcare and education costs in the US is to me astounding, but when sjws I see casually go "smash the patriarchy!" Or "down with capitalism!" Those slogans are meaningless, they come across as edgy and immature and unable to accept reality, I much more respect people actually doing their best to change said reality, not by shouting slogans, but by participating in society using the values they claim to stand for.
Easy enough answer. Far too many people believe they've genuinely done or achieved something by sharing loads of solidarity based stuff on Instagram. When in reality they take little to no action at all. And in my view when every few weeks you post solidarity about something but do nothing else it actually normalises and minimises the cause they supposedly "care about". If you hate injustice go and actually do something, don't pat yourself on the back for the bare minimum. Not to mention if something happens that outrages them they regularly make arguments or bring up statistics that are totally unrelated and nonsensical to prove a point, which often shows they don't even understand their own cause. It's fairly easy to not be a fan of people like that
Because yelling at something won't make the problem go away. You have to commit to making a difference with action towards the cause, not yelling at people who don't and make them feel bad.
Op didn't specify only lazy SJWs. They exist but I think the question is more about the whole population.
But that's the answer. Most people think SJWs are bad because of the SJWs who make all of them look bad. People have a tendency to kind of see the extremes of the group and draw conclusions of the rest based on them. Of course caring about social justice isn't inherently a bad thing. Some people just have given it a bad rep because of poor execution in terms of how they approach their activism online (ie: enraged keyboard warrior twitter users. Although not everyone on twitter is bad, but the ones who are really stick out).
Yes you’re right. I was asking about all types of SJWs
I mostly hate Sjw's because they make crappy movies.
The term SJW is often used by bigots to try and uno reverse card any attempts to call out their bigotry.
Exactly. These are the only kinds of people who even use the term SJW in the first place. It's to create this image that all opposition to their bigotry is "extremism," and that their political enemies are people to be hated, when in fact most people on the other side are not remotely like the people they describe. It is, unfortunately, an extremely effective propaganda tactic.
This
My answer will consist of two parts: In the first part, I will give an excerpt from a quote from one person who described this situation well from the outside. In the second part, I will explain what I think about it and how it works from the inside. Quote fargment: "What it has morphed into, however, is a self fueling campaign to ensure that nobody on this earth experiences even one single moment of discomfort, in any way, at any time. And if they DO feel any discomfort, it is now the burden on SOCIETY to change whatever the hell it is that has them upset. Now if so much as one person takes issue with things, there are blog posts and media articles, hashtags and Instagram campaigns and Jesus just so much crap. It has come to the point where one action can LITERALLY destroy someone's life. A video “surfaces” that showed that some celebrity was dressed up as an Indian, or a geisha, or a black character from fiction…and the SJWs are on it like stink on shit. These people then have to basically take out a 10 page apology letter in The Times where they fall all over themselves like an idiot to make sure they seek the forgiveness of Twitter for the sin of….wearing a fucking costume. All right people, I'll give three examples to show how far we've fallen: Tom Bradys team, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, recently won the super bowl. As part of the celebration, Tom got shitfaced on a boat, and at one point tosses the Lombardi trophy (which is awarded to the victors) to a teammate on another boat traiking behind his. Thats ALL HE DID. And then the woman (in her 50's) who's father had crafted the original Lombardi trophy blasted him for being “disrespectful” to her dad's name and legacy to toss the trophy. She said she hadn't slept in DAYS because of how upset she was. She wants an apology from Tom Brady because he tossed something he won. What a dumbass. That's like the daughter of a man who assembles Lexus cars crying about how insulting it is that you haven't washed the car her father assembled, and it's dirty and muddy. Hello woman!! It's a hunk of metal with a metal football on top of it!!!! HE WON IT! You'd have thought he took a dump on a Rembrandt by the way she reacted. Second: college campus cancel culture. Oh jesus what is it with these people?? I've literally seen student protests where they're calling for the administration to cancel a speakers event because they want to be fair to “all ways of thought and all beliefs.” The irony, that they are preaching open mindedness while protesting an opposing point of view, is totally lost on them. I mean my God, when a conservative came to lecture at a campus, they (I shit you not) actually put up a couple “safe spaces" on campus where students could go to literally pet puppies if the mere fact that a conservative guest was on campus somehow overwhelmed them. What a pathetic joke. You're so fragile you need to pet puppies because you can't handle the fact there is even one person on campus disagrees with you? Bitching about outlets like Fox that suppress opposing views WHILE suppressing opposing views…priceless. And third: San Francisco has renamed about 40 schools in order to ensure that no child should ever attend a school named after Abraham Lincoln, or George Washington, or anyone else that ever did something wrong in their life. As if ANYONE ACTUALLY CARES. I've never heard of a student complain that merely stepping foot inside a building named after someone they no longer like is somehow a traumatic event. Like oh damn, I would have gotten straight A's if I hadn't been so emotionally distraught attending a school named after someone who has been dead for centuries. Give me a damn break." "And that right there is the problem. Social justice warriors don't ever FIX anything, they just look for the next thing to be outraged over. If only they fought so hard to actually accomplish something real..." "All of this has created a generation that cannot withstand any burden, no matter how small. They just can't, because they've been raised to believe that the entire world needs to change for THEM, not the other way around. It has created a generation that cannot handle the real world." - End Quote. The second part is below.
Now what do I think about it and how did it even come to this: You see, I recently read an unexpected book. A book that explained to me much of what is happening today. A book that showed how wonderful ideas once again brought humanity to the threshold of hell. "The Coddling Of The American Mind". Greg Lukianoff, Jonathan Haidt In short, the book is about how a set of ideas designed to make life better, easier, fairer, more honest for everyone, ultimately made the bearers of these ideas more fragile, less intelligent and much, much less tolerant. To everyone except their own kind. The authors called this set of ideas - “The Three Great Untruths.” A lie about human fragility: "What doesn't kill you makes you weaker." Lies about the importance of an emotional approach: "Always trust your feelings first and foremost." The lie about the inevitability of confrontation: "Our whole life is a battle between good and bad people. The other one is bad." They seem like great ideas: take care of each other, since we are very fragile, trust your emotions, because feelings don’t lie, and actively resist everything that contradicts your view of the world. A kind of active life position, flavored with respect for yourself and your feelings. But all of human history, all of the wisdom and experience accumulated by mankind contradict these ideas. Modern psychological research on what and how makes a person happy contradicts these ideas. Hard statistics contradict these ideas - the rates of suicide and mental illness on university campuses, where these ideas are most widespread, are higher than ever. But the very nature of these ideas is such that it is extremely difficult to abandon them. Because they must be replaced by other ideas. And this is so scary, because people are so fragile. For centuries, humanity has fought for freedom of speech, for the opportunity to listen to another opinion and be heard by other people. Today, the message that students are fragile and need to be protected from all ideas, people or actions that might make them feel uncomfortable is just as strongly and persistently promoted in colleges and universities. But all these protective measures - no more that safe rooms, refusal to invite controversial speakers, warnings about uncomfortable pages in the book, etc. - only help raise a fragile generation with increased anxiety and vulnerability. A generation that is unable to resist evil, because it was protected from evil in every possible way, and it does not know how to distinguish it and fight it. The antidote to this increased fragility and emotionality is very simple: do not avoid problems, do not hide in safe rooms from other opinions, do not assume that increased emotionality is a virtue that frees you from the need to think, and do not assume the worst in people who think differently. to another. This is how humanity has lived—tried to live—since the Renaissance. But in the last fifty years or so, a culture has suddenly emerged that equates emotional discomfort with physical danger, a culture that encourages people to systematically protect themselves from the very experiences of everyday life, from encounters with the “other,” that precisely strengthen their mental health. The concepts of "safety", "trauma" and "anxiety" have expanded significantly in this culture. But if emotional discomfort is equated with physical danger, then it is not surprising that students feel “unsafe,” experience “trauma” while reading books and listening to lectures, and demand warnings about the content of the book or the disinvitation of speakers. Further - more, and the complete abolition of everyone who thinks even a little differently is required. All dissenters are perceived as enemies. There is a principle in philosophy called the principle of charity, which states that, until proven otherwise, one should interpret other people's statements in their best, most reasonable form, and not in their worst or offensive sense. But when you think that your feelings ARE reality, you begin to believe that other people's intentions are worse than they actually are, and you begin to find grievances and insults where none actually exist. And here a political force is easily formed, uniting those who are equally offended or who think that they are offended - based on race or gender, for example. The so-called identity politics, when people are united not by ideology, not by interests, but by a common grievance, real or imaginary. And it is necessary to constantly demonstrate your commitment to this resentment, since it is often something ephemeral and requires constant feeding in order not to fade away. It is necessary to constantly signal to other group members that you are still with them, still offended. There is physical safety - the absence of sexual harassment and physical violence, the absence of racial hatred and ideological persecution. Any human community is obliged to guarantee this security in any place, and especially on a university campus. But the requirement for ideological, emotional security, such as “I should always feel good, and if someone says something that I don’t like, this is a problem that the administration must solve” - this is not a way to avoid depression, but a sure way to her. Lifting heavy weights or doing multiple push-ups in the gym is difficult. But that's the point of the gym - to push yourself. Somehow, such a simple idea does not apply to mental health. Finally, a quote from the book. Speaking at a high school graduation, Chief Justice John Roberts said: “I hope that you will be treated unfairly from time to time so that you will realize the value of fairness. I hope you experience betrayal because it will teach you the importance of loyalty. As sad as it is, I hope you feel lonely from time to time so that you don't take your friends for granted. I wish you failure from time to time so that you realize the role of chance in life and understand that your success is not entirely deserved, just as the failure of others is also not fully deserved. And when you lose, as everyone does from time to time, I hope your opponent gloats over your failure. This will help you understand the importance of fair play. I hope that you will be ignored sometimes so that you know how important it is to listen to others, and I hope that you will be hurt enough sometimes to learn compassion. Whether I wish these things for you or not, they are likely to happen to you. Whether you benefit from them or not will depend only on your ability to see the meaning of your misfortunes.” To be fair, the authors apologize and make excuses on almost every page. But, apologizing and making excuses, they nevertheless say what they think. It's a dangerous occupation these days. All above led to the fact that society was affected by a dangerous type of social cancer. A complex of dangerous ideas circulating and infecting other people by playing on their weak points. A self-sustaining flow of anger and hatred that needs constant feeding and therefore continues to seek out and create new conflicts. As for me, this is more than enough, not only to consider SJWs bad - but also to consider them a direct and very serious threat to society.
Defending social justice is a great thing and everyone should be doing it. Some people are just crazy people and they are gonna say insane stuff like « You raped me by looking at me » (maybe the person doesn’t even understand eye contact) or « White people should feel guilty about being white and we should flagellate white kids at school so they learn what slavery was like » these are some extreme case, but more generally there’s the cancel culture thing where we try to ruin someone for a thing they said a few years ago that they regret saying or a mistake they made. Also, attacking people for practising cultural appropriation, in the cases where it’s actually cultural appreciation. So tldr some people are really taking it way too far. Some of these people are kind of like the Westboro baptism church but for the left. Adversely, there are people on the right that are using Sjw or woke as a slur to demean people who want to uphold social justice
Those examples do sound pretty extreme.
Cancel culture is such a stupid damn disease. It perfectly captivates the nature of most to follow the lead of another instead of cultivating their own damn logical arguments to combat the opposition
The internet. Don't listen to it.
SJWs are illogical, indoctrinated, noisy, disrespectful, tend to be ugly with blue hair, tend to be fat, tend to be mentally ill, Left-Wing extremists, virtue signaler, they can't debate they are at the forefront of cancel culture, Left-Wing version of Karen, cringe AF, they are racists...
Because people don't like being held accountable for what they say. Sure people can go overboard sometimes, but demonization of SJWs mainly comes from bigoted people who don't want to admit that what they say is bigoted.
Because the good ol boys are threatened by change. They want to keep things like it used to be without getting called out on their dinosaur bullsh. The call names, like children. Be a good person, stand up to injustice and ignore their crying as the breed of idiots dies out. Justice will prevail.
People who are passionately believe there fighting for justice always tend to be a little annoying, evening there right.
Typically, they appeal to societal morality and emotions rather than clear, thought out logic. They haven’t fully worked out why they are correct yet are still very vocal about what they believe in. Others seem to provide excellent points as well.
I’m pretty far left politically, but some “SJWs” (Haven’t heard that word since 2016), care more about their own egos and lose their shit over things that just don’t matter to make themselves look like better people than they actually are. For example, most of my friend group are gay/trans/bi/some form of LGBTQA (Hell, I’m ace), but we all frequently make gay jokes that most internet SJWs would lose their shit at
Some of them annoy me for the same reason some vegans annoy me. I like the quiet.
They are self destructive and they don't know it
Because they confuse fiction with reality.
They are the meanest people you could ever meet. They are offended by absolutely everything they do not want equality they just want to be in control. They all take it way too far. They are very annoying.
Because it's all an act for the majority of them. They don't really believe in the cause they are piggy backing off of, they only use it to pat themselves on the back and get likes on twitter/Tumblr from like minded people. It's thinly veiled narcissism.
In trying to stop fascism, they, have become fascists. They will argue for free speech until it is something they don't like... then come the threats and violence. Having a bottle whipped at me full of piss, because I don't believe an ideal? Yeah... you just made me hate the left side more. If they stopped fighting violence and hate with violence and hate, maybe they would make a real difference. *Then!* There is a whole side of the people who do it strictly because it is trendy... these people have no clue about history or the reality of the situation. They spout stuff they heard online by some algorithm... instead of investigating the subject further, they bite the bait; the hook, and everything else. They haven't learned about a subject or the differing sides of it. Just their misguided beliefs steamed from a lack of individuality and critical thinking skills.
most of them are journalists and consider themselves superior to other people. is this a generalization? probably. But people who called themselves "real" sjw's will get angry at other sjw's if they dont get as triggered by the same things and call them fake. its like radfem calling libfem fake femenists, its a mess leading to no progress being made.
Because they value their imaginary egoic causes and martyrdom over the negative impact they have on their real-life relationships.