She is correct. Instead of smugly telling people "it's not my job to educate you" the left should be offering a helping hand to people who are looking for answers. The smug attitudes towards the working class need to fucking stop if we want any chance in the future.
If you don't talk to them, someone else will.
“As revolutionaries, we don’t have the right to say we are tired of explaining. We must never stop explaining. We know that when the people understand, they cannot help but follow us.”
— Thomas Sankara
Yeah I always understood the sentiment to mean that its not the job of oppressed people to justify their existence to bigots when being subject to that bigotry can be traumatic.
Why do internet leftists have this culture of always choosing the least charitable reading of any statement? Is it contrarianism? Clout chasing? Just misanthropy?
If you're convinced Twitter constitutes the public sphere and impacts reality, then bad tweets actually manifest fascism
Gotta slide in with a slick burn for the "updoots" and "retwats", the more "updoots" and "retwats" you get, the more socialister you become.
Hey you know what happens to be a really good way to make building any solidarity impossible? This fucking shit.
Every keystroke is another knife jammed into your heart
Reading a bad take is the most severe oppression I have ever experienced. If you disagree you're doing a violence to me, which is not a good look tbqh.
I admire and respect Sankara, but I still have to say it
The West Wing except it's set in the UN during the Cold War and all the big epic speeches are diplomats from ML states dunking on NATO ghouls
While not every socialist is going to be equipped to educate people on every subject, and won't always have the energy to spare, they can always be prepared to direct people to those who can educate or existing written material which covers a given subject.
Yeah, I definitely have sympathy for people have gotten into enough bad-faith arguments online that they don't see the point in getting into discussions with people they disagree with. It's easy for someone to suck up your time and energy. Sometimes I engage because it seems worth it, sometimes I ignore nonsense because I feel like it would be a waste of time. And there's always the silent audience to be considered--even if the person you're talking to is arguing in bad faith, you may persuade others. But there's no denying that it's a common chud tactic to ask for an education with no intention of actually listening. At least having some kind of quick source to direct people to can be a way to respond without wasting time casting pearls before swine. Good suggestion.
people have gotten into enough bad-faith arguments online that they don’t see the point in getting into discussions with people they disagree with. It’s easy for someone to suck up your time and energy
I think we'd all be better off thinking more carefully about who's reachable/persuadable and who's too far gone to bother with.
And there’s always the silent audience to be considered–even if the person you’re talking to is arguing in bad faith, you may persuade others.
Excellent, excellent point. A corollary to this -- one that also works as a counter to chuds who will just endlessly waste your time -- is to just stop responding after a few comments, when the visibility of the conversation drops way off.
Oh, I like the suggestion of keeping the visibility of the conversation in mind. That's a really solid suggestion for keeping enough hope to bother responding, while not getting sucked into an endless and pointless argument.
I also realized after I wrote my other comment that I guess I already kind of do a "stock answer" thing, when TERF-y stuff comes up. I wrote out a long thing once about how, years ago, I had some TERF thoughts, felt bad, took the time to educate myself, and learned not to be an asshole. I realized that I basically had "How to Not be a TERF," so I saved it to my computer and now I post it again when it seems like people are either trying to figure out how to talk to a TERF in their lives, or starting to lean towards being a TERF themselves. Sometimes people respond and want to talk through stuff more, and sometimes there's no response, but at least it's out there if people find it helpful.
"Stock answers" are a great way of at least reaching that silent audience without a ton of effort. :100-com:
Christ these people need to go outside. They flaut on twitter how cool and left you are but do nothing but shitpost online. Volunteer at a homeless shelter, join the IWW , organize a protest do something actually valuable with the energy they waste getting heated on twitter.
We Leftists really have to learn to tell somebody to go fuck themselves more often. Leftists often can't stop themselves from engaging with dumbass takes. It only wastes energy and precious time.
Example
Person: hur dumb take look at my steaming hot take, please attention I crave attention
Me: how about suck my dick?
Person: that's not civil you must engage with my ideas 😤😬
Then go do something useful instead. 💪🏻
The enlightened centrist inside me says both are
correctincorrectincomplete(?). Of course it's an ideal to always persuade and proselytize for the left, but damn if I don't get exhausted arguing why some people should have rights to willfully ignorant people, over and over again.People get tired and have a right to pass on an exhaustive activity, but to make it a habit devoid of internal and external context is not something people should embrace.
“As revolutionaries, we don’t have the right to say we are tired of explaining. We must never stop explaining. We know that when the people understand, they cannot help but follow us.”
-Thomas Sankara
