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Seems to be a long way of saying to go get offended but not too offended.
> Seems to be a long way of saying to go get offended but not too offended. Mmmh yeah, it's a little more than that. He suggest that being offended is OK, while taking unreasonable action because of said offense is not acceptable.
My motto is "Follow the Dread". If I dread public speaking I should do it, if I dread setting up IPsec VPNs I should do more of it, if I dread working with money and run a business as opposed to working solely as a technical person I should do it, so on and so forth. "The Dread" is a good north star for discovering what to improve next, since most Dreads are somewhat common/shared among peers, communities and colleag…
...But the dread is still there. I still regret it every time I have to do it. It's just less stressful now.
That said, I would really love it if everybody could calm down and stop getting offended so much.
Realize that from the perspective of the other person, YOU are the one spewing obvious falsehoods and uttering offensive things. Everybody is the hero in their story.
Yes, some trolls are out to cause offense. You know what empowers and enables those people? Success. If anyone actually does get offended by their trollery.
However, it seems to me that conflating disagreement and offense, and in particular using that to shut down discussion, is a symptom not a root cause. I believe that the root cause is that one half of the current culture war has refused to recognize the validity of offense or prioritize the issues that are at the heart of the offense.
As a result, the other side has concluded that conflating disagreement & offense, and using that as a weapon against opponents, is their only option.
TL;DR: - disagreeing and being offended aren't on the same level - getting offended is a good thing, it shows you care deeply about an issue, you should do it more - behaving like and ass***e because you're offended is not ok
I agree with the premise of this article; that discussion would be improved if we were more explicit about when we disagree and when we are offended. However, it seems to me that conflating disagreement and offense, and in particular using that to shut down discussion, is a symptom not a root cause. I believe that the root cause is that one half of the current culture war has refused to recognize the validity of offe…
I agree with the premise of this article; that discussion would be improved if we were more explicit about when we disagree and when we are offended. However, it seems to me that conflating disagreement and offense, and in particular using that to shut down discussion, is a symptom not a root cause. I believe that the root cause is that one half of the current culture war has refused to recognize the validity of offe…
This is a great point. I suppose my hope is that by being less shutdown-offended yourself, you can have an open heart to those that are shutdown-offended. Because engaging with such people is crucial to understanding what’s actually going on (rather than just lobbing facts and conflicting histories back and forth). Trauma is real!
In terms of improving discussion by differentiating between disagreement and offense:
I think that in order for that to work, it is important that offense is treated as valid and worth addressing. First because, as the article points out, offense is often based on valid fears and concerns. Second because otherwise people will feel the need to present their offense as disagreement in order to get it taken seriously.