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 -  (3 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?

[–]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.