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Authoritarianism of Millenial Social Justice


PhuturePriest

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PhuturePriest

This is a lengthy article, but it's very much worth the read. It should generate much discussion amongst those who take the time to read it.

But millennials are grown up now — and they’re angry. As children, they were told that they could be anything, do anything, and that they were special. As adults, they have formed a unique brand of Identity Politics wherein the groups with which one identifies is paramount. With such a strong narrative that focuses on which group one belongs to, there has been an increasing balkanization of identities. In an attempt to be open-minded toward other groups and to address social justice issues through a lens of intersectionality, clear and distinct lines have been drawn between people. One’s words and actions are inextricable from one’s identities. For example: this is not an article, but an article written by a straight, white, middle-class (etc.) male (and for this reason will be discounted by many on account of how my privilege blinds me — more on this later).

https://medium.com/@aristoNYC/social-justice-bullies-the-authoritarianism-of-millennial-social-justice-6bdb5ad3c9d3

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ermagerd I'm halfway through this croutons article, does it get any better?

edit: I'm finished. There are a few good points but it's written really crappily and makes a lot of stupid points as well, but eh it's the internet no need to go on a crusade against it.

I give it a 1.5/5 stars

Edited by Ice_nine
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Not The Philosopher

I read it a few weeks ago and thought it was interesting. It's true that identity politics has become a blunt weapon, especially in higher ed.

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veritasluxmea

tenaflyviper:  specialsnowflakehunters:  moreprivilegedthanyou:  fucktheillogicalbullshit:  my sides  For goodness’ sakes.  Kek~Hunter Ryu  Humanity needs to be eradicated.We are vermin to a beleaguered planet that is in desperate need of a can of cosmic Raid.

I didn't read the entire article but I know it's gone to far. This isn't a parody. 

Edited by veritasluxmea
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truthfinder

tenaflyviper:  specialsnowflakehunters:  moreprivilegedthanyou:  fucktheillogicalbullshit:  my sides  For goodness’ sakes.  Kek~Hunter Ryu  Humanity needs to be eradicated.We are vermin to a beleaguered planet that is in desperate need of a can of cosmic Raid.

I didn't read the entire article but I know it's gone to far. This isn't a parody. 

I don't know whether or not to laugh or cry - I'll attempt do both

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tenaflyviper:  specialsnowflakehunters:  moreprivilegedthanyou:  fucktheillogicalbullshit:  my sides  For goodness’ sakes.  Kek~Hunter Ryu  Humanity needs to be eradicated.We are vermin to a beleaguered planet that is in desperate need of a can of cosmic Raid.

I didn't read the entire article but I know it's gone to far. This isn't a parody. 

Whoever took that screenshot has there facebook language as Latin. That's amesome.  

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This is a lengthy article, but it's very much worth the read. It should generate much discussion amongst those who take the time to read it.

But millennials are grown up now — and they’re angry. As children, they were told that they could be anything, do anything, and that they were special. As adults, they have formed a unique brand of Identity Politics wherein the groups with which one identifies is paramount. With such a strong narrative that focuses on which group one belongs to, there has been an increasing balkanization of identities. In an attempt to be open-minded toward other groups and to address social justice issues through a lens of intersectionality, clear and distinct lines have been drawn between people. One’s words and actions are inextricable from one’s identities. For example: this is not an article, but an article written by a straight, white, middle-class (etc.) male (and for this reason will be discounted by many on account of how my privilege blinds me — more on this later).

https://medium.com/@aristoNYC/social-justice-bullies-the-authoritarianism-of-millennial-social-justice-6bdb5ad3c9d3

Without bothering to read the whole article, I'll just say that this nonsense isn't something unique that "millennials" came up with on their own, but the result of them swallowing much indoctrination from their older, leftist college professors.

It's past time for some good youthful rebellion, I say.

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I read the entire article and think it is good, true, and important.

But I agree with Socrates that this didn't start with Millennials. It started with their professors. My professors.

I particularly like the section you quoted, FP, and also this:

The problem with this brand of modern social justice advocacy is that who one is as a person (race, class, gender, etc.) is the be all and end all of their capacity to have a certain viewpoint.

I saw this problem a long time ago. It's even worse then he goes into, though, because the tendency he's addressing boils our whole identity down to what we can list on a government demographic check-list. I'm sure we'll keep adding to that list as time goes on, but it will never be enough to actually capture the richness of even one person's identity.

I once visited a Master's Philosophy program on the East Coast. Not many women study philosophy. A guy in the program was playing tour guide for me. It was near the end of the semester, so everyone was in their offices doing stuff. At some point, I and my tour guide were standing in the grad student office hallway and about 10 of the other grad students had come out of their offices to meet me. All of them were male. My tour guide somehow came to mention that he was a feminist, and then, like playing dominos, every single guy in the circle, in order, took his turn saying, "Yeah, I'm a feminist," "Yup, I'm a feminist, too." Except when the last guy's turn came, he said, "I'm not a feminist. I'm for social justice."

I respected that last guy the most, partly because the other guys' statements just looked like a pathetic bandwagon attempt to impress the woman coming to the department. But also because the last guy's view most closely represents mine: When we fight for social justice based on group membership, we do a lot of injustice to people who don't belong to one of our pet groups. When we fight for social justice period, we consider every individual, regardless of "who they are", and that is inherently more just.

The principle of the matter is also important to consider: Do I deserve justice because I'm a woman? No. I deserve justice because I'm a human being. And so does everyone else, including straight white men. Even the rich ones. ;) 

Thanks for posting this, FP. I've favorited it and am sending it to several other people!

Edited by Gabriela
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PhuturePriest

I read the entire article and think it is good, true, and important.

But I agree with Socrates that this didn't start with Millennials. It started with their professors. My professors.

I particularly like the section you quoted, FP, and also this:

I saw this problem a long time ago. It's even worse then he goes into, though, because the tendency he's addressing boils our whole identity down to what we can list on a government demographic check-list. I'm sure we'll keep adding to that list as time goes on, but it will never be enough to actually capture the richness of even one person's identity.

I once visited a Master's Philosophy program on the East Coast. Not many women study philosophy. A guy in the program was playing tour guide for me. It was near the end of the semester, so everyone was in their offices doing stuff. At some point, I and my tour guide were standing in the grad student office hallway and about 10 of the other grad students had come out of their offices to meet me. All of them were male. My tour guide somehow came to mention that he was a feminist, and then, like playing dominos, every single guy in the circle, in order, took his turn saying, "Yeah, I'm a feminist," "Yup, I'm a feminist, too." Except when the last guy's turn came, he said, "I'm not a feminist. I'm for social justice."

I respected that last guy the most, partly because the other guys' statements just looked like a pathetic bandwagon attempt to impress the woman coming to the department. But also because the last guy's view most closely represents mine: When we fight for social justice based on group membership, we do a lot of injustice to people who don't belong to one of our pet groups. When we fight for social justice period, we consider every individual, regardless of "who they are", and that is inherently more just.

The principle of the matter is also important to consider: Do I deserve justice because I'm a woman? No. I deserve justice because I'm a human being. And so does everyone else, including straight white men. Even the rich ones. ;) 

Thanks for posting this, FP. I've favorited it and am sending it to several other people!

Yeah, my one disagreement with it is that I don't think us nasty millenials just made this up for the first time in history. We came about it because we were taught to think this way, and I think it's an oversight on his part to think otherwise. 

Regardless, it's still a sensible article. I originally liked it because it was a liberal admitting all of this, but then I thought, doesn't that prove his point? I was particularly receptive to it because of the person saying it, not just what the person was saying. I've unwittingly been indoctrinated into this nonsensical classism as well. 

Edited by PhuturePriest
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Marketing is a big factor I think. It's all about segmenting and subsegmenting and giving the illusion of individuality even while engineering into groups. This is how you build an "advanced" economy.

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I originally liked it because it was a liberal admitting all of this, but then I thought, doesn't that prove his point? I was particularly receptive to it because of the person saying it, not just what the person was saying. I've unwittingly been indoctrinated into this nonsensical classism as well. 

Exactly. It's a rare thing these days to analyze just the ideas presented. I think that's the first sign of a truly polarized society.

 

Marketing is a big factor I think. It's all about segmenting and subsegmenting and giving the illusion of individuality even while engineering into groups. This is how you build an "advanced" economy.

It's not just economic, though. I love Habermas, and I see in this the fruits of the mass society. "Youth culture" is another major culprit. Even the Vatican has bought into that croutons. "Youth culture" is a relatively new thing, the product of industrialism and then advertising having to segment society into separate groups so they can market their junk to them specifically. That generates a sense of group identity based on age, and that generates a really divisive "cohort" mentality that pits generations against one another more severely than ever before in history.

My students are the most ageist generation I've ever come across. The stronger mass-produced "youth culture" grows, the more they think anyone outside their generation is totally alien to them. That's going to make for some really dramatic social shifts when they come into power (which they already are). And I don't think such dramatic shifts are a good thing for a society in general. Gradual is the way to go.

@PhuturePriest: I think the reason the guy probably targeted Millennials is because, until they started taking their profs' liberal screeds into social media, the phenomenon he's talking about was largely an elitist thing, segregated off in academia and maybe somewhat in politics. But the Millennials have taken the whole thing very public, into the mass culture. Once it hit social media, it became a real "blue menace".

Edited by Gabriela
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That generates a sense of group identity based on age, and that generates a really divisive "cohort" mentality that pits generations against one another more severely than ever before in history.

It could be that, because of how rapidly technology is changing our world at a ridiculous, unprecedented rate. I'm growing up in a MUCH different world than my parents and kids coming up now seem to be growing up in a MUCH different world than my parents. Tangentially I guess that has something to do with marketing and industrialism, but also the philosophical pursuit or progression for the sake of progression.

 

As for identity politics, I guess I am a fan and think there are many genuinely positive applications of it. Of course it can be pushed too far, but that doesn't mean it's entirely useless.

As much as you might love to think you're capable of being purely objective in rational we ALL have biases and prejudices that can color how we interpret facts and data. And the thing is when you are part of a dominant group that thinks and tends to behave a certain way you never HAVE TO examine your own biases in a critical light because well, you are in the majority. You dominate. Congratulations. Doesn't mean you SHOULD NOT examine how who you are and where and how you were incubated in whatever culture you came up in, but you can get along just fine without having to do so.

 

In addition I don't think it's (always) entirely an ad-hominem to dismiss someone's ideas based on who they are. An idea in isolation can usually not be attacked unless you look at the logic and biases (even if they're philosophical biases) behind them. So when someone for example, espouses the typical WASP view in just about everything I'm going to question whether he has taken more than five seconds to consider another viewpoint, which is important because people standing in different places can give me different information (FACTS) which will hopefully get at a more complete picture of the truth. But until someone shows me evidence that they are capable of questioning their own biases and/or deviate from their respective cohorts (whether we're talking about race/gender/religion etc.) they most likely (if I'm just rolling the dice) believe the things they do "just because" they grew up that way.

That's why conversion stories are so compelling. It takes a greater amount of energy to uproot and change one's entire philosophy and/or religion than to remain with the same one. So, again rolling the dice, who does the seeker lend more credence to, the convert or the life-long believer? One would assume the convert, having tested her own assumptions and biases and found them lacking, is more capable of looking at things more objectively and critically where the life-long believer might just be blinded to her own biases.

I will also state that I could list all of my demographic info right now and OF COURSE that doesn't capture who I am as an individual. There are qualitative factors that cannot easily be assessed by categorization. However, if you wanted to take a guess with that information at some of the things about my personality and beliefs, you may hit quite a few right on the head. 

However when we're studying movements/beliefs/behaviors/etc of MASSIVE amounts of people we need to categorize in order to make sense of things (I'm thinking along the lines of those psychological and sociological studies we're always citing). We know about differences between groups, but unless we're looking at case studies, differences amongst individuals are harder to quantify and that's probably why they're not dealt with that often. I think that's OK, so long as we recognize this grouping does not capture individuals entirely, even though it may tell us much (or even a little bit) about them.

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