MASSIVE Occasional Link Roundup

I have been so bad at link roundups. That’s why this one is MASSIVE.

First of all, thank you to Secular Woman for choosing me for their Blog of the Year award. It’s quite an honor! Check out all their other 2014 award recipients here. They’re all great people doing great work.

Second, I’ll be presenting my consent workshop at the American Atheists National Convention in Memphis, Tennessee on April 2-5. I’ve presented it twice already (at the previous two Skepticons) and am really excited to make it even better this year.

Finally, here is a reminder that FtBCon 3 is in just a few weeks, January 23-25.

Here’s the MASSIVE list of awesome articles spanning basically the entire second half of 2014.

1. s.e. smith explains that having depression doesn’t necessarily mean being sad all the time:

I feel like I need to engage in a sort of relentless performative sadness to be taken seriously, for people to understand that I really am depressed and that each day — each moment of each day — is a struggle for me, that even when I am happy, I am still fighting the monster. I feel like I need to darken everything around me, to stop communicating with the world, to stop publishing anything, to just stop. Because that way I will appear suitably, certifiably sad, and thus, depressed — and then maybe people will recognise that I’m depressed and perhaps they’ll even offer support and assistance. The jokes die in my throat, the smile never reaches my lips, I don’t share that moment of happiness on the beach by turning to my friend and expressing joy.

2. Libby Anne writes about atheists who take up women’s rights only when it’s convenient:

Frankly, I feel used. These atheist activists are the sort of people who want to use my story as proof that religion is horrible to women but aren’t willing to listen to what I have to say about sexism in our culture at large. They are the sort of people who are eager to use the shooting of young education activist Malala Yousafzai by the Taliban to prove how horrible religion is for women but somehow fail to mention that Malala is a Muslim who speaks of drawing her inspiration to fight for gender equality from the Koran. This is not standing up for women. This is exploiting women as merely a tool in a fight against religion.

3. Olivia Cole on the complicity of white women in anti-Black racism and slavery:

It’s true, white women lacked the agency of their husbands, fathers and brothers, so their hand in slavery did not extend to the buying and selling of human chattel, the laws being made that called black people only a fraction of a human being. But white women whipped black bodies. They burned them. They posed next to the murdered bodies of black people who were lynched. They called people niggers. They scratched faces. They separated families. While wearing their pretty dresses, they ruined lives.

4. Crommunist writes about the friend zone:

As someone who absolutely used to believe in and complain about the Friend Zone, it took a lot of listening and self-examination to accept that it was entirely possible that not only was there nothing wrong with me, but that there was nothing wrong with her either (whoever ‘she’ happened to be at the time). People do things for reasons. Sometimes those reasons are malicious and exploitative and cruel. But at least as often (and I’d say far more often), they’re entirely reasonable and defensible. Part of this problem, to be sure, is that we have adopted a completely bizarre model of relationships that denies both men and women full agency – men as mindless sexual automatons, women as miserly guardians of sexual activity. A more mature understanding of relationships as two people who find ways to enhance each other’s lives allows for the possibility that people could have meaningful interaction that may or may not include sexual intimacy.

5. Brit Bennett writes about racism and good intentions:

Darren Wilson has been unrepentant about taking Mike Brown’s life. He insists he could not have done anything differently. Daniel Pantaleo has offered condolences to the Garner family, admitting that he “feels very bad” about Garner’s death.

“It is never my intention to harm anyone,” he said.

I don’t know which is worse, the unrepentant killer or the man who insists to the end that he meant well.

6. Julian Sanchez writes about harassment and “harmless torturers”:

One reason public discourse about racism and sexism tends to be so acrimonious—though certainly not the only one—may be that we don’t explicitly enough distinguish “harmless torturers” cases from the “bad old days” variety.  Sophisticated critics, of course, routinely stress that misogyny and racism are fundamentally structural problems that can be perpetuated by actions that don’tnecessarily require the individuals perpetuating them to harbor any malicious intentions or vulgar attitudes.  But that’s still what we most automatically associate with the claim that something is “racist” or “sexist”—leading people to take umbrage (often in bad faith, but presumably at least sometimes sincerely) when a particular utterance or action is called out.

7. Eric Meyer writes about Facebook’s “Your Year in Review” feature:

To show me Rebecca’s face and say “Here’s what your year looked like!” is jarring.  It feels wrong, and coming from an actual person, it would be wrong.  Coming from code, it’s just unfortunate.  These are hard, hard problems.  It isn’t easy to programmatically figure out if a picture has a ton of Likes because it’s hilarious, astounding, or heartbreaking.

Algorithms are essentially thoughtless.  They model certain decision flows, but once you run them, no more thought occurs.  To call a person “thoughtless” is usually considered a slight, or an outright insult; and yet, we unleash so many literally thoughtless processes on our users, on our lives, on ourselves.

8. Dana Bolger writes about the harmful discourse surrounding “victims” versus “survivors”:

In elevating those who “move forward,” the victim/survivor dichotomy implicitly condemns those who do not, reaffirming myths about what constitutes a good versus bad survivor, and legitimizing certain forms of survivorship over others. To be a (strong) survivor is to carry that weight — figuratively, and literally. To be a (weak) victim is to crumble, “stay” silent, engage in self-harm.

9. Britni writes about men (hi Richard Dawkins) who try to “rank” forms of sexual assault:

The only reason forcible kissing would not be “life-changing” for me would be because I experience so many forms of sexual violence on a constant basis that my life is alreadychanged. My life looks inherently different than a man’s does. It also looks inherently different than it would if I were not subjected to sexual violence in the form of catcalling, groping, online harassment, and rape threats on the reg, or if I’d never experienced other forms of sexual assault and rape. My life is a reflection of the fact that I’m constantly on guard or on edge, constantly on the defense when I’m around men that I do not know and wary of men that I do know. My entire LIFE is a “life-changing” event, and most women that I know would tell you the same thing. It’s exhausting to have to worry about being assaulted every damn day, but we do it. And yeah, we have to look at the world through the lens of Schrodinger’s rapist because our experience tells us that we must. That is a result of cumulative, constant, pervasive incidents of sexual assault and violence over a lifetime.

10. Dean Roth wrote a beautiful piece about loving someone who is depressed:

Sometimes, your depressed friend wants to hang out with you so they can scream about how awful they feel. It’s not because we need attention, but because we know you value our wellbeing and want to help us affirm our struggles. But I am a depression vampire; to talk about myself, I need to be invited in. If you simply ask how I’ve been doing, I’ll just say “oh you know, fine.” Please be so explicitly clear that you want us to open up.Logically, those suffering from depression probably know that our loved ones won’t mind if we just start talking about our problems. Nonetheless, depression loves to tell us that our friends are not actually our friends. If you reassure us that we have a place in your life, we can begin to rebuild our trust in the world and our own self-esteem.

11. This article by Shea Emma Fett is about abuse in polyamorous relationships, but a lot of it is applicable to monogamous relationships as well:

If you are being abused, there is a very high chance that you will be accused of being abusive or of otherwise causing the abuse. That’s because this accusation is devastatingly effective at shutting you down and obtaining control in a dispute. However, I also believe this accusation is often sincere. People often engage in abusive behaviors because they feel deeply powerless and that powerlessness hurts. But not everything that hurts in a relationship is abuse, and not everything that hurts your partner is your responsibility. It’s important to be able to distinguish abuse from other things that may happen in relationships that are hurtful, or may even be toxic or unhealthy, but are not fundamentally about entitlement and control.

12. Paul Fidalgo writes about the brutalization of women in video games:

In modern civilization there is simply no excuse for manufacturing entertainment that holds up the brutalization of women as virtuous and worthy of reward. None. It’s not necessary even if the aim is to create the most suspensful, pulse-quickening adventure game. The only reason to do it is to titillate a certain demographic, and make them feel more powerful than the automata women placed in the games.

13. Lis Coburn has a fantastic take on the idea that children receive “too much” praise:

Validating someone means recognizing that a person’s own perceptions are worth listening to. It is recognizing them as real human things that real humans think. When they say, “I hate myself,” or “I’m worthless,” or “I wish my mother would die,” validation is saying, “Yeah. I can see you really do. You feel this way really strongly.”

Most of what was cast in the 80s and 90s as failure to praise children was actually failure to validate them. When a child comes to an adult, dripping with defeat, and says, “I failed,” praise is, “No you didn’t! You did really well!” and validation is, “You’re really disappointed with how you did, hunh? That sucks.” And over time, if adults do nothing but praise, what children hear is: Your self-doubt and weaknesses are not wanted here. Failure is not acceptable, not even thinkable. I cannot accept you unless you do well.

14. Laurie Penny on why we’re winning the culture war:

Their rage is the rage of bewilderment.

They can’t understand why the new reaction to nude selfie leaks isn’t ‘you asked for it, you whore’, but ‘everyone does it, stop slut shaming.’ They can’t understand the logic of a world where ‘Social Justice Warrior’ just doesn’t work as an insult, because a great many people care quite a lot about social justice and are proud to fight for it.

They can’t understand why they look ridiculous.

15. Greta Christina explains why it’s nonsensical to use the word “radical” as an insult:

Insulting an idea (or a person) simply because they’re radical is an empty insult, devoid of any actual critical content. It’s like calling someone a poopyhead. (Unless, of course, the person’s head is actually made of poop.) And rejecting an idea (or a person) simply because you see them as radical is a sign of lazy thinking. In fact, it’s a sign of no thinking. It shows that you haven’t actually given the idea any consideration. It shows that the only consideration you gave the idea was to think, “I haven’t heard that before, it’s unfamiliar and it seems extreme, therefore it’s wrong.”

16. Ashe Dryden has some really good advice for coping with online harassment.

17. Kate Harding on misplaced concern for “free speech” online:

I’ll go to the mat for the First Amendment, but as far as comments on private websites are concerned, I say squelch ‘em all. The right to speak your mind does not include the right to parasitically attach yourself to a high-traffic website in order to reach an audience you could never earn on your own.

18. Heina discusses the “happy” Down syndrome stereotype:

“Positive” stereotypes are anything but. Those who more or less fit into them are pigeonholed, those who fit some but not all of the characteristics are identity-policed, and those who don’t fit them at all are thrown under the bus. Avoiding such splash damage is as simple as remembering that people with disabilities should not have to achieve heights of perceived “goodness” in order to be allowed to exist, heights that would never be asked of those without disabilities.

19. Katherine Lampe writes about shaming people for attempting/committing suicide (TW):

When you shame a person for mental illness, for attempting or completing suicide, what you’re doing is trying to make yourself comfortable at their expense. When you say, “Think of the people you will hurt,” you’re saying, “THINK OF MY COMFORT!” But most of the people I’ve known who’ve struggled with mental illness have already done that, and it didn’t work. We’ve already thought of you. We’ve already done the volunteer work. We’ve already found new hobbies. We’ve looked at the greeting cars we’ve saved from family and the letters from lovers. It’s not that we don’t know. It’s that none of it helps. And you think… You think, “Who’s the more selfish? Me, for wanting not to have to live in this pain? Or you, for insisting I do to spare you?”

20. Culturally Disoriented on what happens when disabled people try to “self-advocate.

21. Mia McKenzie discusses the ways in which (white) people get distracted from the issue at hand in the wake of a police shooting of a person of color:

But let’s get something straight: a community pushing back against a murderous police force that is terrorizing them is not a “riot”. It’s an uprising. It’s a rebellion. It’s a community saying We can’t take this anymore. We won’t take it. It’s people who have been dehumanized to the point of rightful rage. And it happens all over the world. Uprisings and rebellions are necessary and inevitable, locally and globally. This is not to say that actual riots don’t happen. White folks riot at sporting events, for example. Riots happen. But people rising up in righteous anger and rage in the face of oppression should not be dismissed as simply a “riot”.

Don’t be distracted by terms like “rioting”. Whether you’re for or against uprising and rebellion (side-eye if you’re against it, though), it’s a tool, not the issue itself. The issue is yet another Black teenager murdered by police. His name was Mike Brown.

22. Sarah Jones writes about the silencing of rape/abuse survivors:

Imagine telling a veteran that they’re too emotionally connected to the subject of war to discuss it properly. Anyone making that argument in public would be dismissed as a crank—and they should be, because it’s an absurd argument. We otherwise readily acknowledge that a person’s direct experience with a subject makes them more qualified to discuss it. It doesn’t grant them infallibility, of course. Nobody can lay claim to that. We’re talking about some level of expertise that the average person doesn’t necessarily possess.

But we hold women to a different standard when the subject is abuse. And then we dismiss them as conspiracy theorists when they start to talk about the existence of a rape culture.

23. Misha explains how people unintentionally enable bullies:

How do you effectively bully as an adult? The same way you effectively bully as a kid: you either figure out the places you can do it where no one else will see you, or you figure out the ways you can do it that people will either not notice or disregard.

24. s.e. smith suggests things to do instead of giving unsolicited advice:

Instead of unsolicited advice in response to a statement where someone is simply speaking to something that’s going on in her life, try just saying: ‘I hear you.’ If you have experience in that area, ‘I’ve been there.’ If you don’t, ‘I’m listening.’ ‘So sorry you’re struggling with this.’ ‘Thinking of you.’ Just stop there. You don’t need to say anything else. The original comment was simply a statement, an expression of frustration or anger or grief or fear or pain, and sometimes, people just need to know that people are paying attention, that people are thinking of them.

25. Leigh Alexander offers some tips for responding to online sexism and discussions thereof:

DON’T: Make stupid jokes. You might be one of tons of people Tweeting at her, tone is hard to read online, and you shouldn’t be putting anyone, especially someone who does not actually know you, in charge of figuring out your sense of humor when they are under stress. You might just be trying to lighten things up or cheer the situation, but let people be angry, let them have heated discussions if they want and need to. Imagine this: Your dog dies, and a stranger walking past thinks you should cheer up, or take it less seriously, and decides to joke about your dead dog. What would you think of them?

26. Jenn M. Jackson on the historic white fear of Black people:

The fear that black people would become too wealthy or accomplished was what caused early twentieth century southern whites to strategically lynch some of the most accomplished black families, the ones who owned a horse and buggy or a nice suit jacket. The fear that black women would steal white ‘massas’ from their whites wives resulted in the intentional objectification of black women’s bodies and hair, demoralizing them, beastializing them, making them into sexual beings rather than human beings. The fear that blacks were thinking too highly of themselves and threatening white business ownership was what caused them to burn it down on June 21st, 1921. White fear has systematically and by design demolished and suppressed black wealth, mobility, and familial progress for over three centuries. What we are witnessing today is no accident.

27. Some excellent advice from Captain Awkward about antidepressants and abusive families.

What have you read or written lately?

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MASSIVE Occasional Link Roundup
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2 thoughts on “MASSIVE Occasional Link Roundup

  1. AMM
    1

    #19 — Yes!

    After Leelah Alcorn’s suicide got all over the blogosphere, I kept reading posts and comments by people saying “suicide is not the answer!”

    To me, especially in that context, that sounds like victim-blaming.

    I wrote a response to one of these, saying that if you weren’t actually closely involved with Leelah (or any other suicide) around the time of the suicide, you have no idea what they were going through, and it sounds awfully privileged to tell her after the fact that she shouldn’t have done it. (The old “unless you’ve walked a mile…” thing.)

    The commenter responded that I was ignoring what she (the commenter) had gone through (plus some other stuff that didn’t make any sense to me.) People who say this stuff, especially people who’ve gone through a suicidal period, are awfully invested in that narrative.

    I remember a time, some 50 years ago, when I thought every day about suicide. I occasionally heard people talk about suicide, and when they did, the focus was always on how selfish and unfair the person who did it was to the survivors, never on how miserable the person must have been to take that drastic step. I knew that if I ever did it and succeeded, no one would give a damn why I did it, they’d only care about how bad I was making them feel. (But at least I wouldn’t be around to hear it.) But if I tried and failed, all that I would get would be a lot of shaming for making other people feel bad and for my unjustified “selfishness.”

    To this day I don’t know why I didn’t kill myself back in my darkest days. There are days even now when I’m not sure why I don’t do (inertia, I guess.) I know there are people who’ve suffered far worse despair, with far more reason. If I knew someone in that state, I would do what I could to help them feel better, or at least understood and supported. But if they go ahead with it, I’m not going to add posthumous blame to their misery.

  2. 2

    This is my favorite thing written in response to the Charlie Hebdo massacre.

    The killings in Paris were an appalling offense to human life and dignity. The enormity of these crimes will shock us all for a long time. But the suggestion that violence by self-proclaimed Jihadists is the only threat to liberty in Western societies ignores other, often more immediate and intimate, dangers. The U.S., the U.K., and France approach statecraft in different ways, but they are allies in a certain vision of the world, and one important thing they share is an expectation of proper respect for Western secular religion. Heresies against state power are monitored and punished. People have been arrested for making anti-military or anti-police comments on social media in the U.K. Mass surveillance has had a chilling effect on journalism and on the practice of the law in the U.S. Meanwhile, the armed forces and intelligence agencies in these countries demand, and generally receive, unwavering support from their citizens. When they commit torture or war crimes, no matter how illegal or depraved, there is little expectation of a full accounting or of the prosecution of the parties responsible.

    I wish the so-called “New Atheists” would spend some time on the way in which patriotism can function as a sort of ad hoc religion. (To be fair, I think Dawkins does touch on the subject in The God Delusion, but it’s very much an aside, and it shouldn’t be.)

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