Intersectionalism is the worst thing to happen to feminism.

submitted by medium_tomato from self.GenderCritical

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[–][deleted] 16 insightful - 1 fun16 insightful - 0 fun17 insightful - 1 fun -  (6 children)

I'm cynical enough to think that pretty much everything that describes the situations of a vulnerable minority will either be hijacked or ignored because the average person wants theory to include them or they ignore it. Anything else requires a lot of empathy.

I'm disabled, and remember when non-disabled people were being told not to use spoon theory for situations where a good night's sleep would fix it – does anyone even talk about spoon theory anymore?

[–]Lemonade_Masquerade 21 insightful - 1 fun21 insightful - 0 fun22 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

Woke circles use oppression points like currency. It's no wonder they want to try to cheat the system as much as possible.

Definitely could use some more empathy. The ability to say "your situation and my situation are different and we have different needs" is missing from so many of these people's mindsets. It's like they think their feelings and experiences are universal. Spoon theory was also my first thought. I had only heard it from people who use it when talking about mental health for so long before I found out that it was a concept for disabled people. "Trigger" has gone through a similar process as it was specifically a PTSD term before it became a word for "generic thing that makes me uncomfortable."

I am so uncomfortable with how much those circles promote self-diagnosis for mental disorders, for this very reason. Many mental illnesses are normal thought processes taken to the extreme. That's why so many people can read a list of vague symptoms and think "Oh, that's me!" in the same way you can read any random horoscope and feel the same way.

It seems very related to how they don't appreciate the need for clear language. They only use language to express their subjective experience. If men can be women, then "spoons" can apply to any mental illness you want. If penises are female, then getting bored sometimes can be ADHD.

[–]puffball 9 insightful - 2 fun9 insightful - 1 fun10 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

It bugs the hell out of me when people self-diagnose and then turn around and use their status as a weapon to silence others, to gain favorable treatment or exceptions to rules. Not just because of the dishonesty and despicable acts they try to have excused, but more so for the incredible damage it does to those who are actually diagnosed and suffering from the consequences of their actual, real, ailments.

These assholes' abuse of their appropriated status turns the very real problems and suffering of those who actually are affected by these ailments into a joke, a stereotype and significantly erodes the average person's willingness to make the allowances and provide the help that the real sufferers so desperately need. Not only that, but they also soak up many of the scarce resources intended for those with actual diagnoses.

And as a final "fuck you" to the actual victims, when these fakers eventually get caught out having faked their illnesses, the result usually is for the general population to treat everyone who claims these ailments with skepticism or even outright dismissal, again making life even worse for the actual sufferers.

If reading a list of symptoms cause you to think "Oh, that's me!", go see a freaking doctor about it, don't update your damn Facebook and Twitter status with your newfound "diagnoses". It's what you'd do if you thought you genuinely had cancer, so why are these illnesses any different?

[–]Complicated-Spirit 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I can’t count the number of times I’ve had white males tell me that white male privilege applied to them, but not really, because of X, Y and/or Z.

“White male privilege doesn’t really apply to me because I’m on the spectrum. No, I’ve never gotten a formal diagnosis, but that’s just evidence of how disadvantaged I am.”

“White male privilege doesn’t really apply to me because while I look like a regular Western European white male and my name seemingly reflects that, I’m actually more Eastern European, with a strong Romani and Syro-Turkish background. My family denies it, but that’s just because of their shame due to internalized racism.”

“White male privilege doesn’t really apply to me, because while I am a white male, I am also queer. If you don’t know what ‘queer’ means to me, I’m under no obligation to define it to your bigoted ass. It can mean whatever I want. The fact that you seem to think that I’m bullshitting that white male privilege doesn’t really apply to me because I’m queer due to some ‘demand’ on your part that ‘queer’ meet some predetermined definition of your own choosing only goes to show how disadvantaged I really am.”

[–]endthewoo 11 insightful - 1 fun11 insightful - 0 fun12 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

Yeah but spoon "theory" was terrible anyway. Not a theory, and not even a particularly good metaphor (since when were random bits of cutlery analogous to lack of energy ?) It was actually a good example of internet in-group speak, but like anything, yes, even that was hijacked.

[–]puffball 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

It was an attempt to explain something that is very hard to imagine for someone not personally affected. Spoons were just a currency to help keep track, and if they'd been sitting somewhere other than a restaurant, something else would have been used to denote the currency.

The real point was only the idea of energy/willpower/ability to act being a severely limited resource that some of us need to carefully manage throughout our days, lest we find ourselves at a deficit before our day ends. And where such a deficit will usually have serious, often catastrophic, immediate consequences.

As metaphors go, it's actually a pretty good one and captures the essentials pretty well, as long as you realize that it IS a metaphor, and that the "spoons" just as well could have been pebbles, pencils or damp pieces of navel lint.

If the use of cutlery as the currency is what's confusing to you, then I don't know what to tell you other than that metaphors probably isn't something you're quite ready for yet.

[–]cybitch 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

The real point was only the idea of energy/willpower/ability to act being a severely limited resource that some of us need to carefully manage throughout our days, lest we find ourselves at a deficit before our day ends.

That's all human beings. As someone with chronic pain, the best way to explain it imo is fight or flight. When you're in pain, your body is essentially in fight or flight mode, so you're on high alert and the same environment that you would normally find it easy to focus in is too much for you in that state. This leads to you becoming tired much more easily. The whole "spoons" thing is maybe good when you're explaining things to a child but it won't lead to adults taking you any more seriously.