#cisphobia

The ability to find conservatives hilarious instead of terrifying is a privilege.

Additionally, there is nothing more jarring than being in a minivan full of supposedly liberal straight cis white boys who are all acting like Donald Trump being elected would be simply funny and a little embarrassing rather than “I and a significant number of my friends would suffer material hardship and possibly be directly injured or killed if that happens.”  (Though honestly, simply being in a minivan full of cis straight white boys is scary enough on its own, even if they’re all related to you.)

–Golbat

Equality Golbat: No one should be drafted, regardless of gender.

Even if military drafts are an example of sexism harming men, no one should have to be drafted from the start. Military drafts remove all people’s agency. If the people don’t want to go to war, they shouldn’t have to be forced into it.

The people should ultimately decide whether or not to go to war.

-Glaceon

Equality Golbat: Being annoyed with “political correctness”, instead of being hurt by people refusing to be respectful, is a privilege.

Your favorite children’s book is probably racist and sexist.

Or, if it’s not, the author probably also wrote things for adults which will extremely disappoint you.  (Yes, this is mostly about my thesis reading.)

–Golbat

If hate rhetoric conflates two categories, then the hate is about both categories and no amount of hairsplitting is going to change that.

Or, it might even really just be about the actually not-bad category.  When someone calls all Arabs terrorists, they don’t really hate terrorists, they’re justifying hating Arabs.  When someone calls all gay people pedophiles, they hate gay people more than pedophiles.  When someone condemns feminists for being socialist lesbians, it’s a pretty good chance that they just hate women, as well as socialists and gay people.  Bigots noticeably don’t care about or even at times glorify white terrorists and straight pedophiles, so it’s pretty easy to tell what they’re actually talking about; and it’s not simply misconceptions, it’s deliberate.  Hairsplitting instead of pointing out hateful attribution is derailing.

–Golbat

Yes, not all Muslims are Arabs.  No, you can’t act like islamophobia isn’t a race issue.

The rhetoric of islamophobia is heavily racialized and islamophobia is used primarily to excuse racism; therefore islamophobia is a race issue.

–Golbat

Deadnaming: Referring to a trans person by a name they’ve retired.

The term deadnaming comes from the fact that it’s often done to trans people who are dead. Typically their parents along with some political and/or religious group take the opportunity to aggressively misgender them when they can no longer object. 

Deadnaming can be intentional, meant to dehumanize and disrespect the trans person. Deadnaming can also be accidental; sometimes you don’t see someone for a while, and you don’t know they’ve changed their name. Not using their current name dehumanizes and disrespects them, regardless. 

–Nidoqueen & Glaceon

Vaccines are easy mode for your immune system, not the nightmare mode version of “regular” pathogens.

Actually, vaccines aren’t just easy mode, they’re literally the tutorial at the beginning of the game that’s like one enemy coming very slowly and the display is “this is how you shoot things.”  That is the entire point of vaccines: making your body able to recognize and defeat specific pathogens without you having to actually get sick first.

–Golbat

If your immune system can fight off pathogens, imagine how easily it can deal with vaccines.

Vaccines are weakened or dead germs.  They can’t fight back against your immune system the way normal germs can.  If you’re willing to take the chance that your immune system could beat measles or w/e, then logically you should be more willing to have it deal with the vaccine because it’s less risk.  Also, not being sick and having to miss school/work is a good thing.

–Golbat