It's a joke, my good man. The dummy literally has a comb over.

Lionhime · 2022-06-23T20:08:43+00:00

This was a bad decision. Generally speaking, dramatically burning effigies loses you credibility.

Plus it validates the TRAs’ “they’re trying to genocide us!!” It’s mean-spirited and vaguely threatening. Best not to give them fuel so to speak. Now they can point to this dumb thing.

Lionhime · 2022-06-23T19:54:14+00:00

Irl. You talk to people you know, especially who you don’t agree with.

My advice is to approach delicately (“Do you mind if I ask you some questions? I guess I feel confused about this”), keep things personal to you and ask them a lot of questions about what they believe.

Questions like “what’s a man/masculinity to you?” and “what’s a woman/femininity to you?” Depending on your own sex. Are good, and they will answer if you make them feel comfortable enough, and don’t feel like you’re trying to trap them.

Of course their answers will sound really sexist, so then ask them if you don’t like those things, are you still a man/woman?

They will usually also let slip some really concerning reasoning about why women don’t want to be the female gender. Let them outline their points. They might say “some women feel oppressed by expectations for women in society, or they were assaulted and don’t feel comfortable in their body anymore.” You can follow up with more open-ended questions, like “wow, interesting, so how do you think the assault led them to change genders?”

If you’re talking to someone you know, tread carefully, and always inhabit the “I’m just confused and trying to understand” role. Never attack, never appear to be trying to trap them. They will close up and you may damage your relationship. Try to get them to explain as much as possible in their own words. Believe me, even they will notice how weird it sounds out loud.

One of the most effective things you can do is to keep things personal. They will not want to invalidate your feelings. It goes against their ethos.

For example, tell them honestly about how this hurts you personally: “I have been told I’m not a woman if I don’t like cultural stereotypes, and it makes me feel like I have to opt out of my own gender. It makes me feel alienated, and to my ears it sounds sexist. It’s frustrating to me.”

If you were kind to them during the conversation, they will acknowledge your feelings, and possibly even agree with a couple of your points! It’s all baby steps.

Lionhime · 2022-06-23T16:44:55+00:00

Thanks Lea Thomas. The sight of him looming over second and third place was the best visual representation of this whole charade I could have asked for.

Lionhime · 2022-06-23T16:41:17+00:00

Pete Buttigieg got a weirdly intense hatred from the far left. By all accounts he was a caring and involved mayor, so they had to throw a bunch of things at him until something stuck (“racist”). Why? Because he demolished some crumbling vacant houses that the black residents literally asked him to demolish.

Lionhime · 2022-06-23T16:36:50+00:00

Ooh, am I becoming a republican? I just thought to myself, “then move.”

Lionhime · 2022-06-23T16:32:48+00:00

Lol if you’re a woman on Reddit you get called a guy and “him” all the time, even with a female avatar. Getting “misgendered” is not a big deal unless you have mental issues.

Lionhime · 2022-06-23T16:20:07+00:00

Hey, what’s important is not the posts themselves. It’s the impact you had on other people by writing them, right? We all contributed an island of sanity in a sea of authoritarian bullshit.

TiA gave me strength to take my feelings of discomfort about gender ideology seriously. It helped me realize there’s another option outside of keeping your gender or choosing a new one: not subscribing to the idea of gender. I’m female and that’s it.

And who knows, maybe a few TiA outsiders questioned their beliefs. The discussion never stops. It has to keep going.

Lionhime