After months of getting close, the relationship between Trump and his so-called ‘first buddy’ has become ‘fraught,’ according to a New York Times reporter
Hey, just so you’re aware, a lot of women and trans people find this joke pretty misogynistic and transphobic since it implies that it would be more demeaning for Elon to be a woman or queer than it is for him to be his regular cringey self. Something to keep in mind so we don’t friendly-fire on our allies!
Edit for anyone still struggling with this: if 👏 you 👏 misgender 👏 ANYONE 👏 on purpose 👏 then 👏 trans 👏 people 👏 will 👏 not 👏 trust 👏 you 👏
ThePowerofGeek, you’re great and appreciated and I hope you don’t read anything below from the people who want you to have a worse reaction so their feelings don’t get hurt vicariously.
So, I tried with you. I attempted to communicate a valid point, which is that comedy is important in society and we should care about it, but you literally ignored all of it completely and came back with this stupid clapping edit which confirms what I already knew. Your argument is in bad faith and you are a counter-productive self righteous person who doesn’t care that you pushed us even further from this level of hypersensitivity than before this conversation. Because the goal here was to feel superior. Enjoy that.
I don’t think you, or the people you’re claiming to represent, understand the joke. First Lady Musk refers to Trump, not Elon. The implication isn’t that it’s demeaning to be a woman or queer, but that the spouse of the President has no real power or authority. This has nothing to do with their gender, and everything to do with the fact that they are the unelected spouse of an elected official.
The only ones who benefit when you misinterpret things in a way that implies unintended and unsubstantiated bigotry, are those who can use it to reinforce their claims of a misguidedly hypersensitive left, and thereby undermine justified recognition of intended and substantiated bigotry.
Generally, jokes aren’t funny when you convolute them with a distracting term that people don’t know.
Kamala Harris’ husband was Second Gentleman and would have been first if she had won
This is probably the second time I’ve read that term in 4 years. Still had to think about what it meant. I am getting the impression you don’t make a lot of jokes or find them as vital as I do. I say that because I wrote several paragraphs about jokes, why they are important, and why I think it’s bad if people stop making them. At no point did you respond to a word of that, and here I see you prioritizing “being PC” over a joke landing at all.
Then simple question, why not use First Gentleman? Kamala Harris’ husband was Second Gentleman and would have been first if she had won.
Going by your logic, that would be offensive to me, as a gay man.
But this kind of hypersensitivity, especially when applied regardless of context or intent, is one of the main drivers of the reactionary sentiment that is allowing the right to win elections all over the world. It’s one of the reasons why the “free speech” argument has worked so well in their favor.
Currently, the only ones benefitting from this “moral high-ground” stance are fragile little baby egos like Musk and Trump who can rest assured knowing their opposition would never stoop as low as them, while they get to freely spew as much intentionally evil shit as they want.
A society where no one is ever offended by anyone is a utopia. It’s as desirable as it is unattainable. I think the best thing we can do at the moment is focus on fighting back, not fighting against each other.
Then simple question, why not use First Gentleman?
Because we’ve never actually had a First Gentleman, so the term isn’t familiar. This is a scenario where strict accuracy muddles the rhetoric beyond recognition, which defeats the purpose.
You’re speaking with a lot of confidence about the validity of the feelings of a group of people
When did I say anything about the validity of anyone’s feelings?
Because those terms will not aggravate trump. The intent is to aggravate trump not denigrate femininity. Focus ffs. This isn’t about insulting trans people or women, it’s about fighting back on someone who is trying to hurt them.
We will struggle to maintain allies if we cannot focus on the speakers intent and not a willing misinterpretation of their words.
I mean, I understand all that too, but if you have to give that explanation within hours of using the phrase, isn’t it maybe an indication that this is a very real risk:
Something to keep in mind so we don’t friendly-fire on our allies!
Also:
The only ones who benefit when you misinterpret things in a way that implies unintended and unsubstantiated bigotry, are those who can use it to reinforce their claims of a misguidedly hypersensitive left, and thereby undermine justified recognition of intended and substantiated bigotry.
I hate to say it, but I don’t see much difference between relating the position of the right wing in an attempt to silence someone telling you that your turn of phrase was insensitive and actually holding the right wing position yourself. Do with that info what you will, I’m just calling it like I see it.
The Batman imagery makes a lot of sense, because it’s a fiction and I couldn’t ever imagine “the good guys” taking moral high grounds and winning wars (in Ukraine, etc) without guns.
(I say this as someone who agrees that the USA has way too many guns - but they’re a tool built for a purpose)
the fact that some people will happily take a beating if it means they keep some “moral high ground” they get to be smug about would be funny if it weren’t so sad, and if it weren’t what got us four more years of the orange dipshit.
The intent is to say something that will antagonise Trump. The intent is not to demean women.
Attacking someone who shares your moral platform because you purposefully misinterpret their words to suit a separate agenda is friendly fire.
Transphobia and misogyny are not to be tolerated, do you really think that someone attacking turnip (autocorrect, I’m leaving it) online doesn’t share your views on this?
Stip trying to police speech among your allies. Focus on intent. Stop with the nonsense infighting we are at war rn.
I think you’re right about all this. Just wanted to add that this joke is (a little) funny because it simultaneously points out that trump and Elon are misogynistic and kind of gleefully watches them squirm about it, since you know they are also reading it in their own social media feeds.
If someone is offended by this joke, I would agree it’s kind of hypersensitive but more importantly they are missing what the joke means at all. They noticed concepts they get upset about and not really understood how the concepts are being used.
Tldr; This joke is funny because it points out these assholes’ bigotry and taunts them with it. It kind of trusts the audience to see that the entirety of the joke is inherently mocking someone for being a bigot.
Haha I’ll take that encouragement! I appreciate you speaking up too. I have tried this kind of pushback before and it’s too easy to get mobbed with accusations of being an awful person, so I tried to tread lightly to avoid a completely pointless hatefest. I think it also speaks to Lemmy and maybe my blocklist that that didn’t happen here. On reddit I’m 99% sure if people read what we wrote we’d get flooded inboxes saying we’re just trying to justify transphobia/misogyny/etc.
Why are trans people’s feelings less important than feelings of people making jokes online?
I don’t want to be arguing here either, that’s why I’m politely letting folks know that these sort of jokes may alienate their allies. You don’t have to do anything with that information if you don’t want to! Don’t engage with this at all, and feel free to let me know what material good you’ve done to fight for trans rights in the time saved, will you?
They are not just jokes. People posting these things are doing so specifically to antagonise the right.
I’m telling you that your concern trolling is alienating allies.
I have chosen to engage in this just like you chose to deal with the blowback when you posted it.
All I have done to “fight for trans rights” is to speak out when I can, challenge bigotry as I am challenging you right now, stand up and be counted at queer marches/events and raise a daughter who took the only trans kid in her high school to prom.
You don’t know my life and that isn’t the discussion. Stop deflecting and learn to focus on intent.
I’m also in favor of the viewpoint that the “First Lady Trump” joke was fine. Just felt the need to comment on the last point; I’ve had that sentiment before too, but I’ve also seen danger in the idea that “Because my intentions were positive, I shouldn’t be criticized.” That’s been a defense used by bigots, too. eg, Trump throwing paper towels to disaster victims (even though he certainly didn’t have to take time out of his day to throw paper towels, gee, how nice he is!)
I’d like to hope that in the past 30 days I’ve never said anything racist/bigoted - but I’d also acknowledge the possibility that despite my positive intentions, I may have. It’s only important because these days very few people think themselves to be bigots. Think about the type of person most likely to say things like “I’m not racist!”
I don’t put much stock in post votes, but I don’t think a majority popular comment that the person I was replying to already agreed with is, uh, getting blowback. Honestly you seem to be the most hostile one here. If you’d read any of the lovely conversations I’ve already had with folks here, you’d understand that I haven’t blamed anyone for this joke, I am simply communicating what I have heard in the community, and I don’t have any expectations of changes in behavior as a result of this.
It’s not bigotry to call out jokes on the internet, btw. For someone fighting a war on behalf of us all I’d figure this would be lower priority!
I’m going to stop responding to you since you don’t seem to be engaging with the intention to actually listen to minorities, ciao!
I don’t put much stock in post votes, but I don’t think a majority popular comment that the person I was replying to already agreed with is, uh, getting blowback.
I see at least 3 people pushing back and I see you deflecting in each case. Since you seem keen to ignore those comments but mention the upvotes you got originally, it definitely does seem like those matter more to you than the reasonable points being made counter to yours.
I’d figure this would be lower priority!
This is false framing. You’re wanting people to think that they’re prioritizing some dumb joke over real lives getting impacted. Considering the number of suicides that happen amongst comedians as just one obvious sign that people use humor to cope with how fucked up life can be, I’d say humor should be higher priority than it is in society currently. And we obviously don’t need to hurt people’s feelings for humor to exist (already hearing you typing something about that), but if something so benign is elevated throughout society as inappropriate to say, less jokes happen, and frankly more suicides happen (and yes I also hear you typing about trans people having a higher suicide rate – I am aware).
Just as a personal example, I’ve had pretty bad depression for years now but recently started rewatching Malcolm in the Middle again. It’s felt so good to laugh and makes a big difference in my mental health. Due to its age, the show is littered with jokes you could pick apart entirely and remove every sliver of joy from if you wanted to. But since the show makes it incredibly obvious that there’s a good heart behind all those jokes, I chose joy in this case. Joy isn’t something to belittle as just some stupid joke if the criticism levelled actually can prevent countless other (mostly) harmless jokes.
Stip trying to police speech among your allies. Focus on intent. Stop with the nonsense infighting we are at war rn.
Isn’t that what you’re doing by telling trans people to put up or shut up when ‘allies’ use transphobic/misogynist insults against ‘enemies’
How are we supposed to know that we won’t just become the next acceptable target for misogynistic/transphobic abuse if/when we end up on liberals ‘enemies’ list?
Trump and Elon are buffoons, it’s not hard to mock them without tolerating misogyny to do so.
Well the truth is as the world goes down the shitter you’ll lose allies anyway. People don’t care about these issues when they have to worry about shelter and food.
I don’t think the people being misogynistic to some rich assholes on twitter are worried about shelter or food.
That said I also don’t see how the fact that fair-weather allies will eventually abandon their positions when things get hard is a case against having standards for behavior in the here and now.
It isn’t tolerating misogyny, it’s pointing out misogyny and ridiculing misogynists.
It’s OK if you don’t like how that’s being done, and it’s OK if you can’t understand the nuance but policing my speech unchallenged is not what is going to happen.
I think I got the nuance behind ‘bigoted man I disagree with is actually a woman because women amirite?’.
I’m trans, and like actually hate these people, they deserve ridicule. However, if I’m willing to tolerate bigotry on my behalf towards people that are in some out-group, there’s no guarantee that some day I won’t be among that out-group and subsequently targeted by that type of bigotry. Do you understand the issue I’m raising?
I can’t tolerate people misgendering Caitlen Jenner or Blair white because while they suck, it only contributes to an environment where that type of insult is then considered acceptable.
You’re kinda proving you could understand what the joke is if you wanted to, you just refuse to acknowledge it could be anything but your first thought about it.
So you’re schizophrenic also? There’s literally nothing this could be based on. However in actual reality, I remember you repeatedly and weirdly defending that troll piece of shit UniversalMonk, so I’m not surprised.
I think I got the nuance behind ‘bigoted man I disagree with is actually a woman because women amirite?’.
Nope.
It goes like this: ‘bigoted man is bigoted because this will aggravate his orange tits. If bigoted man was not bigoted it would not be possible to rip on him like this.’
Put another way: ‘I am a bigot, said John.’
If that doesn’t clarify it then I’m out of patience to explain further.
Not actually sure that’s what this joke implies. Any trans/women are welcome to correct me here though. I don’t necessarily trust that this comment getting upvotes indicates that a majority of women and trans people agree with you.
And yes, I know I’ll get downvotes and people convinced I have the worst motives possible but actually my motivation is just that not every joke that can possibly be taken negatively by someone will be taken that way.
I’m just reporting what I’m hearing, I didn’t poll every trans person out there on this. I can’t share my personal communications, but here are two public trans people discussing this over a month ago, if that helps confirm I’m not pulling this from nowhere:
I believe you that someone will think that way about the joke in the thread here on Lemmy, but imo that requires an assumption that I wish people wouldn’t make. Unfortunately I am unable to follow that screenshot you posted. If it contains a joke I am not seeing it.
You asked women or trans people to say otherwise if they disagreed with you- I’m a woman, my friends are trans people, and there are two more trans people as well. Like I said, I can’t poll everyone, but neither can you. You can choose to do with that information what you like, but there’s literally no way to prove this definitively.
As for the screenshot, the order is middle-top-bottom reading order (which I agree is confusing) or smallest font to biggest font. The middle is an account using “Elonia” as a joke, the top is a trans woman who quotes it calling it out for transmisogyny, and the bottom is a trans man replying in agreement with the trans woman.
fwiw I’m a trans woman and I think that it’s still bigotry even if the target is a shitty person. Come up with a more creative insult, it’s not hard to mock shitty people for being shitty without being misogynistic or transphobic.
Thanks for clearing up the post order. I get it now.
I think this is an overreaction to call this person a piece of shit for the joke. It probably took 5 seconds to think of and type. Which tbh so did that reply, which reads more hatefully to me than the joke.
I didn’t mean to imply that if you cannot prove it definitively, you’re “wrong”. These are all opinions. I expanded more on mine in a novel I just wrote in another reply to you (sorry for that length btw)
I appreciate the civil tone here regardless. I know that in the past I’ve seen a lot of conversations like this devolve quickly and I was kinda nervous that could happen 😬
I’m not here to judge the response of the trans people in that post, that’s their business as far as I’m concerned, just posting that it exists. (I happened to be aware of these folks talking about it so I figured it was easy to cite, I’m sure there are plenty of varied responses that are more diplomatic online)
I appreciate the tone as well, but I think it’s something that’s easier when you’re more removed from the issue. As a cis woman, I have the luxury of not being as directly affected by this joke. You can see from my example that trans people talking to other trans people may be much more hurt and angry. If they were trying to explain this in a thread like this, would it be as easy to hold a civil tone? Would someone in your position have the same patience with someone expressing their pain more bluntly as you have with me? Just some things to think about.
I mean, if someone told me I was a piece of shit for defending that joke in the way I did here, I would probably think they are emotional and irrational and maybe a piece of shit themselves. The conversation would be over at that moment and that’s to be expected. If they were respectful about it, it should go well. I buy that systemically downtrodden people should get more leeway in the way they express their anger, but that doesn’t work in a one on one setting. Tell me I’m a piece of shit baselessly, you’ve shut down the conversation and transferred your emotions to me. Now my guard is up and I want nothing to do with you. This happened to me more than a couple of times and my patience with it is quite low because I have zero reason to convince a dickhead that I’m not one
It’s shit like this that makes me understand the difference between a Leftist, a Liberal, and a Tankie.
A Liberal is pro-LGBT rights when it suits them, but will happily queer-code their enemies because at the end of the day, some people are more equal than others.
A Leftist is a normal sane person who can tell which way the wind is blowing, prays for the revolution to come, and doesn’t care about what goes on in another comrade’s bedroom as long as it’s all consensual, unless they’re specifically invited in which case they may bring pizza and a flashdrive of a pirated copy of something classy and colorful to watch when the festivities are over.
And the Tankie would approve of the “God Hates [Slur]” signs, if only they said “Karl Marx”, “The State”, or really anything remnisicent of the kind of boots this particular group likes the lick, instead of “God”, but until that happens they’re allies… for now.
Two tragic truths, Horseshoe Theory is real, and the Democrats are Diet Republicans.
“God Hates [Slur]” signs, if only they said “Karl Marx”, “The State”, or really anything remnisicent of the kind of boots this particular group likes the lick, instead of “God”, but until that happens they’re allies… for now.
I have a lot of experience (too much tbh) with people that position as communists or revolutionaries, but still have conservative brain worms about gay/trans people. Some will self crit when confronted about it, others take the criticism like a personal attack and double down on bigotry.
That response is where the key difference is between someone that’s principled but uninformed and someone who’s just a ‘patriotic’ socialist leaking brainworms.
The instances routinely smeared as ‘rife with tankies’ have generally been the best about actually consistently enforcing rules against bigotry on Lemmy, and in the case of hexbear have been pretty ahead of the curve when it comes to trans inclusion at least from my experience. I only thought to start including pronoun tags in my display name because I liked seeing how normalized it was in their comms.
I have genuinely met people who claimed that LGBT Rights are “Wrong, because it forces Western values on other cultures and are therefore imperialist.”
Me too, I’m unfortunately even related to some, it’s not great.
Anyone on the train on LGBT rights being ‘western decadence’ or imposing over other cultures has actually internalized the (misogynist, homophobic, transphobic) social order imposed by western colonization and industrial-era “westernization” is the natural/traditional way of things. Westernization for many colonized countries meant importing or reinforcing a more misogynist order as that kind of hierarchy was more compliant with capital.
And your fighting for them. Good for you. Want a sticker. It’s a joke. And this can’t offend anybody is how and why we are where we are with more people moving to the right.
For that to be true, I think you must be breaking down the joke to its rough outline to the point that it’s no longer possible to parse this actual joke. If you’re ignoring the target and context, which maybe you are/aren’t, almost any joke can be criticized in a similar way (it might offend someone who could see a similarity between themselves and the way the target is criticized).
In any case I wasn’t looking to ruffle your feathers. Just seemed like a confusing statement to take a very specific joke, about specific people, worded a specific way and consider it just another woman bashing joke. I don’t think that’s what it was, but the person who posted it got kind of scared when you replied the way you did.
I am all for correcting shitty behavior, but I do take some issue with cases where I feel like a charitable reading of an obvious joke was off the table because someone might be offended by it.
And no I’m not a closet conservative or trying to do anything shitty here, just giving an opinion about comedy and intention. Though I expect hate and downvotes because Internet mobs often work that way.
I just replied to your other comment here with some public notes that calling Elon “First Lady” or in that screenshot, “Elonia”, is something that trans people were critiquing for months now. That’s what I mean by this very specific comparison isn’t a new joke.
And similarly on intentions, I didn’t post that to blame and shame the original poster, just to let them know what they were propagating. I know it’s likely not intentional. It was great that they responded with compassion and understanding for someone else’s perspective!
Jokes are not immune from being bad takes, or from critique. I tried to explain in my initial comment why it is that certain people might not vibe with that joke, and you can take that information for what it is. If you want to keep repeating it anyway, you’re certainly free to, but with the knowledge that you may be alienating certain people. That’s a choice of values for you: is the joke funnier than trans people’s comfort and trust?
Yeah I get that you weren’t super judgy about it but still.
I tried to explain in my initial comment why it is that certain people might not vibe with that joke, and you can’t take that information for what it is.
I think what I’m taking issue with is more the tone. It is not a fact that many people will take the joke as something hateful. It is only a fact that some will and that’s their right. Which is fine.
If you want to keep repeating it anyway, you’re certainly free to, but with the knowledge that you may be alienating certain people. That’s a choice of values for you: is the joke funnier than trans people’s comfort and trust?
You’re going off the rails here. I didn’t make the joke… but I smirked at it. Why? Because I knew that it would bother Elon, full stop. I think a lot of people would also intuitively know that also. The point of the joke is to throw shade at Elon by using his insecurities. It is imo a stretch and an assumption to say “it’s because this ‘joker’ thinks women are lesser than!” In fact everything we know about society right now tells us if you publicly mock Elon Musk, there’s probably several political assumptions you could accurately make about you. And being anti-women isn’t among them.
At the risk of getting dog piled if this thread gets any more views… There is some point where we get too sensitive as a society if we don’t moderate our impulses. For me, something like this thread is getting close to that, if not already it.
For the world to be bearable in the slightest, we need comedy. You say “oh this one stupid joke is worth it?” and I say “jokes are worth defending because they make life worth living”. This joke didn’t even elicit an out loud laugh from me but that’s not the point. The point is that there is a chilling effect on comedy when it’s so heavily scrutinized like this. Is it good for people to think before they joke? Yes, always. But at a certain point the conservative dipshits actually become right for once and people will avoid jokes altogether.
Jokes are not immune from being bad takes, or from critique.
Never thought or said that, as it would be braindead to do so. Before you go making further assumptions about my attitude, know that I loved Dave Chappelle more than any other comedian I’ve ever known for many years. But he’s dead to me after his trans “joke” double down. The first time or two I could have forgiven as a uncharacteristically clumsy way to try to include trans material in his act, but after whatever that last one I watched a couple of years ago was called, it became clear: he is a fucking bigot. First couple times, I gave him a charitable reading because he’d earned it with years of seemingly well intentioned comedy. Then he blew all of that because he’s a bigoted old man who couldn’t keep it quiet. I didn’t really hesitate to see or react to that. So no, jokes aren’t immune to shit nor should they be.
My apologies on a few things that I think got misinterpreted there. I meant to type “can” not “can’t” for “you can take that information” and I think that came off worse for the typo (which I’ve edited above). As well, I was referring to the general “you” in regards to repeating the joke, as in “one could keep repeating it if one liked”, not you specifically (which I continue to use below).
For finding the joke funny because Elon wouldn’t like it, the reason Elon wouldn’t like it is because he’s transphobic. It’s not generally considered good allyship to misgender people for laughs, even if that person is bigoted. For a trans example, people misgender Caitlin Jenner because she has a bad political alignment, and trans people are obviously against that (her gender should still be respected even if she isn’t, because misgendering her normalizes misgendering as punishment for trans people others disagree with, liberal or conservative). Similarly, misgendering cis people might do less harm than misgendering trans people, but it doesn’t do zero harm either for the same normalization reasons.
And, like I’ve been saying, I’m just here to inform. No one has to engage with this if they don’t want to. If you interpret it as chilling, then I think that’s a relationship with the joke and the context that you would need to work through individually. It’s okay to have a joke fall flat! Or have certain groups not find it very funny. If you stop telling any jokes because you’re worried about polite criticism, I don’t think you really are interested in making people laugh, you know?
Hey, just so you’re aware, a lot of women and trans people find this joke pretty misogynistic and transphobic since it implies that it would be more demeaning for Elon to be a woman or queer than it is for him to be his regular cringey self. Something to keep in mind so we don’t friendly-fire on our allies!
Edit for anyone still struggling with this: if 👏 you 👏 misgender 👏 ANYONE 👏 on purpose 👏 then 👏 trans 👏 people 👏 will 👏 not 👏 trust 👏 you 👏
ThePowerofGeek, you’re great and appreciated and I hope you don’t read anything below from the people who want you to have a worse reaction so their feelings don’t get hurt vicariously.
So, I tried with you. I attempted to communicate a valid point, which is that comedy is important in society and we should care about it, but you literally ignored all of it completely and came back with this stupid clapping edit which confirms what I already knew. Your argument is in bad faith and you are a counter-productive self righteous person who doesn’t care that you pushed us even further from this level of hypersensitivity than before this conversation. Because the goal here was to feel superior. Enjoy that.
I don’t think you, or the people you’re claiming to represent, understand the joke. First Lady Musk refers to Trump, not Elon. The implication isn’t that it’s demeaning to be a woman or queer, but that the spouse of the President has no real power or authority. This has nothing to do with their gender, and everything to do with the fact that they are the unelected spouse of an elected official.
The only ones who benefit when you misinterpret things in a way that implies unintended and unsubstantiated bigotry, are those who can use it to reinforce their claims of a misguidedly hypersensitive left, and thereby undermine justified recognition of intended and substantiated bigotry.
Then simple question, why not use First Gentleman? Kamala Harris’ husband was Second Gentleman and would have been first if she had won.
You’re speaking with a lot of confidence about the validity of the feelings of a group of people who, I’m guessing, you are not apart of.
Generally, jokes aren’t funny when you convolute them with a distracting term that people don’t know.
This is probably the second time I’ve read that term in 4 years. Still had to think about what it meant. I am getting the impression you don’t make a lot of jokes or find them as vital as I do. I say that because I wrote several paragraphs about jokes, why they are important, and why I think it’s bad if people stop making them. At no point did you respond to a word of that, and here I see you prioritizing “being PC” over a joke landing at all.
Going by your logic, that would be offensive to me, as a gay man.
But this kind of hypersensitivity, especially when applied regardless of context or intent, is one of the main drivers of the reactionary sentiment that is allowing the right to win elections all over the world. It’s one of the reasons why the “free speech” argument has worked so well in their favor.
Currently, the only ones benefitting from this “moral high-ground” stance are fragile little baby egos like Musk and Trump who can rest assured knowing their opposition would never stoop as low as them, while they get to freely spew as much intentionally evil shit as they want.
A society where no one is ever offended by anyone is a utopia. It’s as desirable as it is unattainable. I think the best thing we can do at the moment is focus on fighting back, not fighting against each other.
Because we’ve never actually had a First Gentleman, so the term isn’t familiar. This is a scenario where strict accuracy muddles the rhetoric beyond recognition, which defeats the purpose.
When did I say anything about the validity of anyone’s feelings?
Because nobody knows what those are.
Because those terms will not aggravate trump. The intent is to aggravate trump not denigrate femininity. Focus ffs. This isn’t about insulting trans people or women, it’s about fighting back on someone who is trying to hurt them. We will struggle to maintain allies if we cannot focus on the speakers intent and not a willing misinterpretation of their words.
I mean, I understand all that too, but if you have to give that explanation within hours of using the phrase, isn’t it maybe an indication that this is a very real risk:
Also:
I hate to say it, but I don’t see much difference between relating the position of the right wing in an attempt to silence someone telling you that your turn of phrase was insensitive and actually holding the right wing position yourself. Do with that info what you will, I’m just calling it like I see it.
I am going to stand by my position that misgendering isn’t cool, thanks
The Batman imagery makes a lot of sense, because it’s a fiction and I couldn’t ever imagine “the good guys” taking moral high grounds and winning wars (in Ukraine, etc) without guns.
(I say this as someone who agrees that the USA has way too many guns - but they’re a tool built for a purpose)
Not using the weapons of the enemy is what landed the enemy a victory.
the fact that some people will happily take a beating if it means they keep some “moral high ground” they get to be smug about would be funny if it weren’t so sad, and if it weren’t what got us four more years of the orange dipshit.
It’s the face the wall comrade meme all over again.
Oh damn the moral paragon of squint batman, the trust fund billionaire beating up the mentally disabled.
Cool the don’t do it. Are you able to do that while not alienating people who share your views perhaps? That’d be great.
Are you?
The intent is to say something that will antagonise Trump. The intent is not to demean women.
Attacking someone who shares your moral platform because you purposefully misinterpret their words to suit a separate agenda is friendly fire.
Transphobia and misogyny are not to be tolerated, do you really think that someone attacking turnip (autocorrect, I’m leaving it) online doesn’t share your views on this?
Stip trying to police speech among your allies. Focus on intent. Stop with the nonsense infighting we are at war rn.
I think you’re right about all this. Just wanted to add that this joke is (a little) funny because it simultaneously points out that trump and Elon are misogynistic and kind of gleefully watches them squirm about it, since you know they are also reading it in their own social media feeds.
If someone is offended by this joke, I would agree it’s kind of hypersensitive but more importantly they are missing what the joke means at all. They noticed concepts they get upset about and not really understood how the concepts are being used.
Tldr; This joke is funny because it points out these assholes’ bigotry and taunts them with it. It kind of trusts the audience to see that the entirety of the joke is inherently mocking someone for being a bigot.
Frankly I think you’ve put it better than I did.
That’s exactly what the joke is about.
The punchline is: ‘they are bigots’, not: ’fuck trans people and women’.
Appreciate you.
Haha I’ll take that encouragement! I appreciate you speaking up too. I have tried this kind of pushback before and it’s too easy to get mobbed with accusations of being an awful person, so I tried to tread lightly to avoid a completely pointless hatefest. I think it also speaks to Lemmy and maybe my blocklist that that didn’t happen here. On reddit I’m 99% sure if people read what we wrote we’d get flooded inboxes saying we’re just trying to justify transphobia/misogyny/etc.
Why are trans people’s feelings less important than feelings of people making jokes online?
I don’t want to be arguing here either, that’s why I’m politely letting folks know that these sort of jokes may alienate their allies. You don’t have to do anything with that information if you don’t want to! Don’t engage with this at all, and feel free to let me know what material good you’ve done to fight for trans rights in the time saved, will you?
They are not just jokes. People posting these things are doing so specifically to antagonise the right.
I’m telling you that your concern trolling is alienating allies.
I have chosen to engage in this just like you chose to deal with the blowback when you posted it.
All I have done to “fight for trans rights” is to speak out when I can, challenge bigotry as I am challenging you right now, stand up and be counted at queer marches/events and raise a daughter who took the only trans kid in her high school to prom.
You don’t know my life and that isn’t the discussion. Stop deflecting and learn to focus on intent.
I’m also in favor of the viewpoint that the “First Lady Trump” joke was fine. Just felt the need to comment on the last point; I’ve had that sentiment before too, but I’ve also seen danger in the idea that “Because my intentions were positive, I shouldn’t be criticized.” That’s been a defense used by bigots, too. eg, Trump throwing paper towels to disaster victims (even though he certainly didn’t have to take time out of his day to throw paper towels, gee, how nice he is!)
I’d like to hope that in the past 30 days I’ve never said anything racist/bigoted - but I’d also acknowledge the possibility that despite my positive intentions, I may have. It’s only important because these days very few people think themselves to be bigots. Think about the type of person most likely to say things like “I’m not racist!”
And they are telling you that your lack of empathy is alienating a different set of allies. Those who you seem to claim to be allied with.
I mean, this is 101 stuff.
https://www.healthline.com/health/intent-vs-impact
I don’t put much stock in post votes, but I don’t think a majority popular comment that the person I was replying to already agreed with is, uh, getting blowback. Honestly you seem to be the most hostile one here. If you’d read any of the lovely conversations I’ve already had with folks here, you’d understand that I haven’t blamed anyone for this joke, I am simply communicating what I have heard in the community, and I don’t have any expectations of changes in behavior as a result of this.
It’s not bigotry to call out jokes on the internet, btw. For someone fighting a war on behalf of us all I’d figure this would be lower priority!
I’m going to stop responding to you since you don’t seem to be engaging with the intention to actually listen to minorities, ciao!
I see at least 3 people pushing back and I see you deflecting in each case. Since you seem keen to ignore those comments but mention the upvotes you got originally, it definitely does seem like those matter more to you than the reasonable points being made counter to yours.
This is false framing. You’re wanting people to think that they’re prioritizing some dumb joke over real lives getting impacted. Considering the number of suicides that happen amongst comedians as just one obvious sign that people use humor to cope with how fucked up life can be, I’d say humor should be higher priority than it is in society currently. And we obviously don’t need to hurt people’s feelings for humor to exist (already hearing you typing something about that), but if something so benign is elevated throughout society as inappropriate to say, less jokes happen, and frankly more suicides happen (and yes I also hear you typing about trans people having a higher suicide rate – I am aware).
Just as a personal example, I’ve had pretty bad depression for years now but recently started rewatching Malcolm in the Middle again. It’s felt so good to laugh and makes a big difference in my mental health. Due to its age, the show is littered with jokes you could pick apart entirely and remove every sliver of joy from if you wanted to. But since the show makes it incredibly obvious that there’s a good heart behind all those jokes, I chose joy in this case. Joy isn’t something to belittle as just some stupid joke if the criticism levelled actually can prevent countless other (mostly) harmless jokes.
Isn’t that what you’re doing by telling trans people to put up or shut up when ‘allies’ use transphobic/misogynist insults against ‘enemies’
How are we supposed to know that we won’t just become the next acceptable target for misogynistic/transphobic abuse if/when we end up on liberals ‘enemies’ list?
Trump and Elon are buffoons, it’s not hard to mock them without tolerating misogyny to do so.
Well the truth is as the world goes down the shitter you’ll lose allies anyway. People don’t care about these issues when they have to worry about shelter and food.
I don’t think the people being misogynistic to some rich assholes on twitter are worried about shelter or food.
That said I also don’t see how the fact that fair-weather allies will eventually abandon their positions when things get hard is a case against having standards for behavior in the here and now.
It isn’t tolerating misogyny, it’s pointing out misogyny and ridiculing misogynists.
It’s OK if you don’t like how that’s being done, and it’s OK if you can’t understand the nuance but policing my speech unchallenged is not what is going to happen.
I think I got the nuance behind ‘bigoted man I disagree with is actually a woman because women amirite?’.
I’m trans, and like actually hate these people, they deserve ridicule. However, if I’m willing to tolerate bigotry on my behalf towards people that are in some out-group, there’s no guarantee that some day I won’t be among that out-group and subsequently targeted by that type of bigotry. Do you understand the issue I’m raising?
I can’t tolerate people misgendering Caitlen Jenner or Blair white because while they suck, it only contributes to an environment where that type of insult is then considered acceptable.
You’re kinda proving you could understand what the joke is if you wanted to, you just refuse to acknowledge it could be anything but your first thought about it.
You’re the type to get weirdly sexual and homophobic when it’s people you disagree with. Not really interested in what you have to say tbh.
So you’re schizophrenic also? There’s literally nothing this could be based on. However in actual reality, I remember you repeatedly and weirdly defending that troll piece of shit UniversalMonk, so I’m not surprised.
Nope.
It goes like this: ‘bigoted man is bigoted because this will aggravate his orange tits. If bigoted man was not bigoted it would not be possible to rip on him like this.’
Put another way: ‘I am a bigot, said John.’
If that doesn’t clarify it then I’m out of patience to explain further.
That’s cool I don’t need any more explanations.
That’s cool I don’t
needhear anymoreexplanations.Hmm, good to know. Thanks.
First asshole musk
Nah, they have at least two each…
Not actually sure that’s what this joke implies. Any trans/women are welcome to correct me here though. I don’t necessarily trust that this comment getting upvotes indicates that a majority of women and trans people agree with you.
And yes, I know I’ll get downvotes and people convinced I have the worst motives possible but actually my motivation is just that not every joke that can possibly be taken negatively by someone will be taken that way.
I’m just reporting what I’m hearing, I didn’t poll every trans person out there on this. I can’t share my personal communications, but here are two public trans people discussing this over a month ago, if that helps confirm I’m not pulling this from nowhere:
I believe you that someone will think that way about the joke in the thread here on Lemmy, but imo that requires an assumption that I wish people wouldn’t make. Unfortunately I am unable to follow that screenshot you posted. If it contains a joke I am not seeing it.
You asked women or trans people to say otherwise if they disagreed with you- I’m a woman, my friends are trans people, and there are two more trans people as well. Like I said, I can’t poll everyone, but neither can you. You can choose to do with that information what you like, but there’s literally no way to prove this definitively.
As for the screenshot, the order is middle-top-bottom reading order (which I agree is confusing) or smallest font to biggest font. The middle is an account using “Elonia” as a joke, the top is a trans woman who quotes it calling it out for transmisogyny, and the bottom is a trans man replying in agreement with the trans woman.
fwiw I’m a trans woman and I think that it’s still bigotry even if the target is a shitty person. Come up with a more creative insult, it’s not hard to mock shitty people for being shitty without being misogynistic or transphobic.
Thanks for clearing up the post order. I get it now.
I think this is an overreaction to call this person a piece of shit for the joke. It probably took 5 seconds to think of and type. Which tbh so did that reply, which reads more hatefully to me than the joke.
I didn’t mean to imply that if you cannot prove it definitively, you’re “wrong”. These are all opinions. I expanded more on mine in a novel I just wrote in another reply to you (sorry for that length btw)
I appreciate the civil tone here regardless. I know that in the past I’ve seen a lot of conversations like this devolve quickly and I was kinda nervous that could happen 😬
I’m not here to judge the response of the trans people in that post, that’s their business as far as I’m concerned, just posting that it exists. (I happened to be aware of these folks talking about it so I figured it was easy to cite, I’m sure there are plenty of varied responses that are more diplomatic online)
I appreciate the tone as well, but I think it’s something that’s easier when you’re more removed from the issue. As a cis woman, I have the luxury of not being as directly affected by this joke. You can see from my example that trans people talking to other trans people may be much more hurt and angry. If they were trying to explain this in a thread like this, would it be as easy to hold a civil tone? Would someone in your position have the same patience with someone expressing their pain more bluntly as you have with me? Just some things to think about.
I mean, if someone told me I was a piece of shit for defending that joke in the way I did here, I would probably think they are emotional and irrational and maybe a piece of shit themselves. The conversation would be over at that moment and that’s to be expected. If they were respectful about it, it should go well. I buy that systemically downtrodden people should get more leeway in the way they express their anger, but that doesn’t work in a one on one setting. Tell me I’m a piece of shit baselessly, you’ve shut down the conversation and transferred your emotions to me. Now my guard is up and I want nothing to do with you. This happened to me more than a couple of times and my patience with it is quite low because I have zero reason to convince a dickhead that I’m not one
It’s shit like this that makes me understand the difference between a Leftist, a Liberal, and a Tankie.
A Liberal is pro-LGBT rights when it suits them, but will happily queer-code their enemies because at the end of the day, some people are more equal than others.
A Leftist is a normal sane person who can tell which way the wind is blowing, prays for the revolution to come, and doesn’t care about what goes on in another comrade’s bedroom as long as it’s all consensual, unless they’re specifically invited in which case they may bring pizza and a flashdrive of a pirated copy of something classy and colorful to watch when the festivities are over.
And the Tankie would approve of the “God Hates [Slur]” signs, if only they said “Karl Marx”, “The State”, or really anything remnisicent of the kind of boots this particular group likes the lick, instead of “God”, but until that happens they’re allies… for now.
Two tragic truths, Horseshoe Theory is real, and the Democrats are Diet Republicans.
I have a lot of experience (too much tbh) with people that position as communists or revolutionaries, but still have conservative brain worms about gay/trans people. Some will self crit when confronted about it, others take the criticism like a personal attack and double down on bigotry.
That response is where the key difference is between someone that’s principled but uninformed and someone who’s just a ‘patriotic’ socialist leaking brainworms.
The instances routinely smeared as ‘rife with tankies’ have generally been the best about actually consistently enforcing rules against bigotry on Lemmy, and in the case of hexbear have been pretty ahead of the curve when it comes to trans inclusion at least from my experience. I only thought to start including pronoun tags in my display name because I liked seeing how normalized it was in their comms.
I have genuinely met people who claimed that LGBT Rights are “Wrong, because it forces Western values on other cultures and are therefore imperialist.”
Me too, I’m unfortunately even related to some, it’s not great.
Anyone on the train on LGBT rights being ‘western decadence’ or imposing over other cultures has actually internalized the (misogynist, homophobic, transphobic) social order imposed by western colonization and industrial-era “westernization” is the natural/traditional way of things. Westernization for many colonized countries meant importing or reinforcing a more misogynist order as that kind of hierarchy was more compliant with capital.
“Horseshoe theory” is a straw man attempt to defang the left.
I used to believe that, but then I met tankies.
And your fighting for them. Good for you. Want a sticker. It’s a joke. And this can’t offend anybody is how and why we are where we are with more people moving to the right.
On the flip side, I feel like his daughter would appreciate it.
I’d want to ask her first, because all the trans people I know personally are icked out by it.
Can I ask what you mean here? You passed your phone around to ask your trans friends if this comment offended them…?
I speak with multiple trans people a day? And we share news and articles? And this joke isn’t original?
For that to be true, I think you must be breaking down the joke to its rough outline to the point that it’s no longer possible to parse this actual joke. If you’re ignoring the target and context, which maybe you are/aren’t, almost any joke can be criticized in a similar way (it might offend someone who could see a similarity between themselves and the way the target is criticized).
In any case I wasn’t looking to ruffle your feathers. Just seemed like a confusing statement to take a very specific joke, about specific people, worded a specific way and consider it just another woman bashing joke. I don’t think that’s what it was, but the person who posted it got kind of scared when you replied the way you did.
I am all for correcting shitty behavior, but I do take some issue with cases where I feel like a charitable reading of an obvious joke was off the table because someone might be offended by it.
And no I’m not a closet conservative or trying to do anything shitty here, just giving an opinion about comedy and intention. Though I expect hate and downvotes because Internet mobs often work that way.
I just replied to your other comment here with some public notes that calling Elon “First Lady” or in that screenshot, “Elonia”, is something that trans people were critiquing for months now. That’s what I mean by this very specific comparison isn’t a new joke.
And similarly on intentions, I didn’t post that to blame and shame the original poster, just to let them know what they were propagating. I know it’s likely not intentional. It was great that they responded with compassion and understanding for someone else’s perspective!
Jokes are not immune from being bad takes, or from critique. I tried to explain in my initial comment why it is that certain people might not vibe with that joke, and you can take that information for what it is. If you want to keep repeating it anyway, you’re certainly free to, but with the knowledge that you may be alienating certain people. That’s a choice of values for you: is the joke funnier than trans people’s comfort and trust?
Yeah I get that you weren’t super judgy about it but still.
I think what I’m taking issue with is more the tone. It is not a fact that many people will take the joke as something hateful. It is only a fact that some will and that’s their right. Which is fine.
You’re going off the rails here. I didn’t make the joke… but I smirked at it. Why? Because I knew that it would bother Elon, full stop. I think a lot of people would also intuitively know that also. The point of the joke is to throw shade at Elon by using his insecurities. It is imo a stretch and an assumption to say “it’s because this ‘joker’ thinks women are lesser than!” In fact everything we know about society right now tells us if you publicly mock Elon Musk, there’s probably several political assumptions you could accurately make about you. And being anti-women isn’t among them.
At the risk of getting dog piled if this thread gets any more views… There is some point where we get too sensitive as a society if we don’t moderate our impulses. For me, something like this thread is getting close to that, if not already it.
For the world to be bearable in the slightest, we need comedy. You say “oh this one stupid joke is worth it?” and I say “jokes are worth defending because they make life worth living”. This joke didn’t even elicit an out loud laugh from me but that’s not the point. The point is that there is a chilling effect on comedy when it’s so heavily scrutinized like this. Is it good for people to think before they joke? Yes, always. But at a certain point the conservative dipshits actually become right for once and people will avoid jokes altogether.
Never thought or said that, as it would be braindead to do so. Before you go making further assumptions about my attitude, know that I loved Dave Chappelle more than any other comedian I’ve ever known for many years. But he’s dead to me after his trans “joke” double down. The first time or two I could have forgiven as a uncharacteristically clumsy way to try to include trans material in his act, but after whatever that last one I watched a couple of years ago was called, it became clear: he is a fucking bigot. First couple times, I gave him a charitable reading because he’d earned it with years of seemingly well intentioned comedy. Then he blew all of that because he’s a bigoted old man who couldn’t keep it quiet. I didn’t really hesitate to see or react to that. So no, jokes aren’t immune to shit nor should they be.
My apologies on a few things that I think got misinterpreted there. I meant to type “can” not “can’t” for “you can take that information” and I think that came off worse for the typo (which I’ve edited above). As well, I was referring to the general “you” in regards to repeating the joke, as in “one could keep repeating it if one liked”, not you specifically (which I continue to use below).
For finding the joke funny because Elon wouldn’t like it, the reason Elon wouldn’t like it is because he’s transphobic. It’s not generally considered good allyship to misgender people for laughs, even if that person is bigoted. For a trans example, people misgender Caitlin Jenner because she has a bad political alignment, and trans people are obviously against that (her gender should still be respected even if she isn’t, because misgendering her normalizes misgendering as punishment for trans people others disagree with, liberal or conservative). Similarly, misgendering cis people might do less harm than misgendering trans people, but it doesn’t do zero harm either for the same normalization reasons.
And, like I’ve been saying, I’m just here to inform. No one has to engage with this if they don’t want to. If you interpret it as chilling, then I think that’s a relationship with the joke and the context that you would need to work through individually. It’s okay to have a joke fall flat! Or have certain groups not find it very funny. If you stop telling any jokes because you’re worried about polite criticism, I don’t think you really are interested in making people laugh, you know?