I have developed superpowers.
I’m not friends with this person and have had zero interactions with her recently – I would estimate at least a year.
[Screengrab deleted]
#tookmymeds + beta-blockers and double melatonin-> some hope of a) not bursting a vessle and b) sleep. Thanks a fucking heap, Ophelia Benson.
I make people suffer misery in their struggle to explain to the world how horrible I am.
So these people are suffering agonies requiring medical treatment because of attitudes people who hate you are implying you harbour, but they expect you to be getting a good night’s sleep as a chunk of cyberspace gangs up on you…?
I don’t think that this is how one de-escalates a conflict.
Ophelia, I almost never comment on FtB, but I’ve been reading you, PZ and many others here for years. I have always admired you tremendously and I have been incredibly upset about what people have been doing to you. To think that in any way you are a TERF or are in any way sympathetic to them is grotesque and flies in the face of the everything I think you stand for. If you can be “accused” of anything at all, it is being a bit cranky and unwilling to be bullied into saying something that you are not comfortable with–hardly faults in my book. Anyway, I am speaking up to express my support for you, and I am very glad that PZ has been defending you.
Thank you essjay.
I would say I’m more than a bit cranky. I’m very cranky, in real life as well as online. I try to confine the real life variety to mutterings and swearings heard by no one but me, but I don’t always succeed. Except with my dog friend. I’m never cranky with him, except if he bolts after a cat when we’re out walking at night. I slap him when he does that, because it’s dangerous; I don’t want him to bolt into the path of a car.
My dog friend isn’t really relevant, but he’s nice, so I like to talk about him.
Anyway I can be cranky to a fault, definitely. Not letting people push me though; I too don’t consider that a fault.
This goes beyond cranky and gets into “petty and vindictive” territory.
Does it? More petty and vindictive than people claiming I’m killing and torturing them?
Your use of your blog implies you believe your words have the potential to affect how people think, and how they feel.
That necessarily includes upsetting people – sometimes greatly.
That’s a necessary consequence of being able to communicate effectively.
To describe it as a “superpower” is equivalent to the ridiculous “sticks and stones can break my bones but words can never hurt me” aphorism.
It’s really not cool to share screen shots you know have a privacy filter. It’s doubly not cool to mock someone for taking meds.
The tragicomedy of otherwise intelligent people who are highly effective communicators denying their power to affect the feelings of strangers is as permanent as death and taxes.
This is so depressing.
This takes the fucking cake. Seriously, I’ve not responded directly to you yet because I personally don’t give a shit about you as a person or blogger. I only care about people you have affecred in this clusterfuck. However posting private posts on a public blog is unethical as fuck. You should be ashamed but I doubt you will be. Futhermore improbable Joe doesn’t once accuse you of killing or torturing anyone. You obviously can’t read for comprehension. Joe is stating a fact that trans women are dying and (implied meanwhile) relatively privileged women are treating their lIves and experiences as an intellectual exercise. This is all I have to say to you personally don’t care one fucking ounce if you let it through moderation. Only hope you read it and realize how far down the rabbit hole of shittiness you are traveling.
If you’re going to make that stick, you’re quickly going to lose your high ground in respect to other people’s paraphrases of your words.
E.g. I thought Joe’s words here were uncharitable and misleading. However, they were not an unreasonable interpretation of intent. I.e. I have no problem believing that that’s the impression he got from your comments.
If you’re going to call other people liars for reporting on such interpretations of intent, rather than your precise words, then it looks really bad to set a different standard for yourself. As a matter of fact, nobody accused you of torturing or killing them. They were describing how you made them feel.
Did you really just share someone’s post about their medications, complete with their full name and image, including the part where they state the privacy settings on that post, with an admission that you’re not friends with them and therefore shouldn’t even have access to it, on your public blog? That seems okay to you?
Lordy. Intelligent people are supposed to learn how to navigate opposing views without hyperemotionalism. And anybody who experiences “stress” due to their participation in a pile on is certainly responsible for their own feelings.
You told me to leave – but just in case I’m not banned I would like to point something out. You just publicly shared a screen shot, on a relatively widely read blog, of someone’s restricted friend’s only post that mentions personal medical information. You have done this for no other purpose than to make fun of the idea that she is upset, so self-defense is off the table as a motivation.
The fact that this is a private post is obvious by the “friend’s only” symbol and the text at the bottom of the screen shot.
I realize that it may be difficult to think things through when you are angry, but if that doesn’t trip some sort of ethical fail-safe in your head, there is something seriously wrong.
Just the other day you essentially screamed at Jason, accusing him of stalking, for commenting on a publicly view-able post of yours. In that context, how do you think someone who shares private posts about the medication they are taking should be viewed?
I realize that you likely feel as though knowledge of the things you have said in candid spaces is a violation of your privacy, but 1) two wrongs don’t make a right and 2) what did SHE personally do to deserve this?
Fair point; I failed to notice the privacy settings. I deleted the picture.
On the other hand y’all are apparently failing to notice that someone is accusing me of putting her life at risk, when I haven’t interacted with her in at least a year.
@andi
I don’t see where any mockery of taking of meds occurred. I do see mockery of claims that someone can be personally responsible for the need of others to take their medication. I’m sure that social conflict can make people worry about their health and exacerbate health problems, but unless we collectively decide to avoid social conflict so no one gets affected in this way the connection to Ophelia is simply a personal attack via directed sympathy and outrage added to a pool of rumors.
As for the privacy filter, I have little sympathy for someone who chooses this sort of irrational personal attack and spreads it through a social network over which they have no control. If someone feels they are being attacked socially attacked unfairly, and that attack impacts them through the wider social network, they should be able to respond to that attack by name.
@llewelly
I don’t see Ophelia denying that they can affect the the feelings of strangers. I do see denial that she can be held responsible for someone having to take their medication. The implicit claim that she is responsible for the medication need is what is being hyperbolically described as “superpowers”.
It was right to take the picture down. I know, that for my part, when I post something to, say, facebook, with “friends only” as the setting, I expect it to stay among friends. It’s troublesome if we excuse the post getting out to more people simply because they don’t have total control over the entire social network.
andi, it is triply not cool to spread hate around against certain individuals when it is totally unnecessary.
@17
I am friends with the person screen shotted. Benson is not the reason she needs this medication. Simply a reason she was having a hard time sleeping bc of all the drama and hurt this has kicked up.
And nobody, including the person screen shotted, claimed that Benson was responsible for her need to take medication. If Benson had spoken to this person before posting a screen shot, then maybe she would have not leapt to unfounded conclusions.
As for your bullshit about this being a personal attack? Benson says so heraelf that she has had zero contact with the person screen shotted for at least a year. This is in no way a personal attack. This was one person discussing their medication and their distress at a current situation in their community exacerbating their condition.
What a bunch of victim blaming garbage to tell someone they shouldnt ever post about their meds or the reasons they take them unless they can control without a doubt who sees it. There are rules for being a decent person. Respecting privacy is one of those rules and Benson couldnt live up to that.
What purpose does sharing a private status of a person who never speaks to you and is not a prominent leader or writer serve? It seems the only purpose this served was for Benson to ridicule someone.
And Ophelia Benson, this is directly to you: removing the screenshot is not enough. What this person says on their private facebook wall is of none of your concern. They did not seek you out for ridicule, but it seems you did seek them out. Even if i hadnt already been convinced of your transmisogyny, this post alone cements you firmly in the “not a decent person” camp in my mind.
” I failed to notice the privacy settings. I deleted the picture.”
That was the right thing to do. Want to bet the haters who accuse you of being a TERF won’t delete their remarks against you on Facebook, Twitter, and Freethought Blogs?
You literally can do nothing right in their eyes because they obviously WANT to hate you!
Just to be clear I’m not dismissing the importance of the violation of the privacy settings. Were I in this situation I would have either removed the picture or replaced it with the names blacked out. People should be able to have a social network of other people willing to respect the confidentiality request. Part of that is making sure the people you do connect with remember to respect that confidentiality. Regardless of any attacked I perceive as irrational I hope that the author of the comment finds out who shared that.
“removing the screenshot is not enough. What this person says on their private facebook wall is of none of your concern. ”
andi, the person you seem to be sticking up for mentioned Ophelia by name. Why? To lie about her?
“Even if i hadnt already been convinced of your transmisogyny, this post alone cements you firmly in the “not a decent person” camp in my mind.”
Get off your damned high horse! This only confirmed my last comment: “You [Ophelia] literally can do nothing right in their eyes because they obviously WANT to hate you!”
@20: I think “Thanks a fucking heap, Ophelia Benson” sounds pretty personal, really.
@andi
A fair reading of
…is that they needed to take their meds because of Ophelia. Even a sarcastic “thanks” is a claim that the taking of meds is needed because of Ophelia.
A “personal attack” refers to the fact that the statement is an attack on another by name. Perhaps I could have worded that differently because “personal attack” has other implications. But I find the statement to clearly be an attack on Ophelia by name, hence an attack directed at a person who gets to take that attack into account when they are affected by it. Your friend’s words constituting a discussion in their private social network don’t change how they effect other people when they escape that network.
I’m not victim blaming because I am not putting any responsibility on the author of the post with respect to how the image was sent. The person who shared it should not have done so, and once the privacy situation was pointed out the image was dealt with as it should have been. As a separate issue I expressed how I feel about my sympathies for a person willing to make the claims that they did with respect to those claims having an effect on them later. My feelings about rumor and outcomes are not a responsibility claim with respect to the privacy violation.
Since Ophelia did not seem to want to deliberately share a private status the purpose of sharing a private status does not seem relevant here. The effects of that sharing certainly are relevant and I hope your friend find out who shared it, and I hope we all get a little more careful about looking for context that indicates that something was meant to be private as a result of this.
The comment in question is representative of others that I’ve seen, which were much more public.
In terms of that set of comments, Ophelia does have a good point in general: it’s silly to opine about how this blog is giving oneself the vapors when reading these posts is entirely voluntary. Nobody has to read either the posts or the comments if they think the content is going to be distressing, just like nobody has to watch a Friday the 13th movie if they find horror movies to be stressful. Specifically referring to Ophelia by name means that she specifically wanted to shame her, if only among her friends: “look what this person has done to me”.
The unreasonable shunning and shaming seems to be very trendy.
That being said, it probably doesn’t help transgender folks who find all this to be stressful, that other bloggers (which they probably read more often) are signal boosting the controversy as loudly (and, generally speaking, as disingenuously) as possible. Indeed, of the several other blog posts that I’ve seen about all this, almost to a person they have pretty obviously not had the mental health/stress interests of their trans* allies at heart, and are instead much more interested in defending themselves and exclaiming CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT OPHELIA SAID THIS ABOUT ME?!
@ andi “Even if i hadnt already been convinced of your transmisogyny, this post alone cements you firmly in the “not a decent person” camp in my mind.”
I reckon coming on to someone’s blog, throwing out baseless claims against the author, and passing judgement on their morality in the manner you’ve just done puts you in the “thoroughly unpleasant” camp in my mind.
Shame that you haven’t used your full name, Andi, unlike Ophelia Benson here, or folks could start writing facebook posts about you, and how you go about bothering folk with your hateful blather.
This is not relevant to the problem of whether the status should have been removed from its context and republished, but sarcastically thanking someone for an effect that their words have had on you does not constitute a lie. Especially in the context here given: Should I refrain from sarcastically/rhetorically thanking Tom Waits when his songs trigger a PTSD reaction, on the grounds that if he saw it he would be really confused because he’s never met me, when I am communicating with friends who know why I’m saying what I’m saying? Am I lying about him if I do so?
Please stop trying to justify this breach of privacy, especially considering that Ophelia has already acknowledged the problem and removed the post.
And, like, *really,* parsing and reparsing words that people said in private and that were wrongly removed from that context is a pretty weird and unfortunate endeavor. They weren’t talking to you, they weren’t talking to the public, and they weren’t talking with the intention that their words should be made public. I mean, they were talking about their meds!
@MrFancyPants
” it’s silly to opine about how this blog is giving oneself the vapors when reading these posts is entirely voluntary. Nobody has to read either the posts or the comments if they think the content is going to be distressing… ”
In the same vein, nobody has to read, for example, R. Dawkins twitterings. Nevertheless, those were criticized harshly here (and rightly so). Isn’t that a double standard?
sonderval@30:
But that is critique. It’s not Ophelia saying “omg Dawkins is hurting my feelz and I cannot sleep!”. The things she posts about Dawkins are valid (and, often, detailed) analyses of substantive points, not self-pitying laments.
Talking about the content of the comment is fine and certainly interesting to some people. Especially the person the comment is directed at. It’s perfectly natural to want to talk about why someone would want to blame another person for their need to take medication as a result of a social situation. Had the comment come from other sources it would be still be just as interesting.
Does the nature of how the comment got here require us to stop talking about it? I don’t think so. The identifiers have been stripped and this is precisely the sort of thing that turns into things like “Ophelia Benson gave someone a heart attack!” after going though a few more people. The affects of these sorts of chosen words, their effects, and the thoughts of what might be going on the the mind of the person making them matter.
@MrFancyPants
But one of the critiques against Dawkins was that using, for example, rape as an example may be triggering for rape survivors. (Remember “University is probably not for you”?)
If that is a valid critique, why is it not valid if someone reading this blog gets triggered by some of Ophelias statements and tells about that in a private conversation (if I understand the workings of the media right)? Because their being triggered is less justified?
To me, your argument seems a bit like “Reading blogs is probably not for you”.
Brony, Social Justice Cenobite@32:
I agree. To underscore that, I added that it is “representative of others I’ve seen”, i.e. it’s certainly not the only such example out there.
Ophelia
As Philip Jose Farmer once wrote – discretion is the bitter part of valor.
Brony, Social Justice Cenobite:
I did not mention meds.
Feelings do affect whether people take meds, and when they take them. However – it is possible the OP normally takes these meds, and for that reason, I was careful not to mention meds in comment. I don’t know the contribution, though a significant contribution would not be unusual. I was referring to the OP being greatly upset, not to taking meds.
The goal of effective of communication is to change behavior. Thus, the potential to change behavior is always an aspect of any attempted communication.
It’s possible the OP intended to imply “responsible” by the word “thanks”. However, I did not use the word “responsible”, because I normally avoid it. It’s not the focus of my complaint. My complaint is about Ophelia’s absurd denial of a plausible and expectable effect of her words on someone’s actions.
The potential for a contribution is unambiguous, even though we don’t know the size of the contribution. To refer to affecting a stranger’s behavior as a “superpower” is denialism, because affecting others behavior is the point of communication. And reaching strangers it the point of communication on a public internet platform.
@4 Ophelia,
Please don’t slap your dog, ever, if it’s after he returns from chasing a car he will have absolutely no idea what it’s all about, use a correction chain to prevent him from bolting in the first place.
sonderval @ 33 – But that wasn’t one of my critiques, so it’s not relevant here. I’m not responsible for other people’s.
Brony, Social Justice Cenobite :
It is a good thing that Ophelia deleted the screenshot.
However, this is a public blog. People do follow it, people do screenshot it, people do archive it. It is likely too late. Since every sizeable community goes through issues in which people find things they “deleted” still circulating around, it’s utter nonsense to believe that deleting something after it was posted has more than a minuscule effect. It’s a polite apology, nothing more.
Shiva,-I mean Ophelia- I know it’s not really an option but sometimes when reading things such as your ordeal, the following has come to mind
http://pictoraltheology.blogspot.com/2015/07/alas.html
sonderval@33:
That’s not what I recalled from the post in question. Indeed, rereading that particular post, what I see is Ophelia’s usual careful dissection and analysis. I don’t see anything in her analysis that would be self-pitying in any way (where, here, the “self” would be the wider community). However, I fear that I may be somewhat misinterpreting you, so allow me to summarize what I think you’re saying:
1. Dawkins being deliberately provocative and triggering stress responses in people was condemned by the community.
2. Dawkins then blaming the triggered persons for their response was considered bad and was called out for it, but the community.
And what I think you’re extending to this situation:
3. An individual felt stressed by her reaction to Ophelia’s comments here at this blog (and possibly elsewhere).
4. You consider me to be engaging in a double-standard by saying that that person’s subsequent comment and blame of Ophelia was “silly”, because of #2, above.
#4 is entirely me, by the way. Ophelia said no such thing, i.e. she never said that she felt that it was “silly”.
I think we differ here in several ways.
For one, the comments that triggered persons at that university were not ones that the victims chose to hear. They didn’t buy and CD called “triggering rape comments” and then voluntarily play it for themselves. And they couldn’t control what the speaker was going to say. (More on “voluntary” below.)
For another, I am not blaming her for her stress response. I don’t see any way that I could, given that stress responses are involuntary.
There is also the matter of degree, and intention. As I mentioned, the original comments that Dawkins referenced were made deliberately, and provocatively. And in response, Dawkins actually said that people who were triggered “were not worthy of a university education”. That’s a fairly astonishing thing to say, given that university educations are not at all optional or voluntary if one wishes to work in many fields. Those people are not really “voluntarily” at the university, if you realize that fact; if they could work in their chosen professions without the degrees, I am sure that they would forgo the years of work and expense and just go straight to their careers.
As I pointed out, reading this blog is entirely voluntary. It doesn’t even require much effort, just a mouse click on a bookmark. Moreover, Ophelia did not deliberately or intentionally try to hurt anyone; in fact, upon realizing that people had been hurt, she apologized. To bemoan ones’ response to such an easily accessible (and avoidable) thing where no ill will was intended (and the effects apologized for) is, yes, “silly”, in my estimation.
You may still consider that I’m engaging in a double-standard, but I disagree.
Yes, I think you do understand the workings okay. That it was a private conversation is neither here nor there, because as I mentioned, it is a comment representative of other, more public comments. I don’t really have an opinion on the degrees of justification of triggering; I’m not certain it’s even worth discussing, since these things are involuntary and “justification” doesn’t even really factor into it.
More accurately, “reading ophelia’s posts about transgender issues when you suspect that you’re going to have a stress response as a result, and then commenting with self-pity, suggests that you are making silly choices”.
I don’t begrudge anyone the right to read whatever they want. I do give a definite side-eye to someone who knowingly walks off the end of a pier and then complains that they fell off.
Speaking as a Trans-Native American I can sympathise with trans-women from all over our fertile plains.
I took drugs to darken my skin, dyed my hair black, got myself some moccasins and a papoose, and when I arrived at the reservation and asked everyone to “Call me Halona” they laughed at me and threw me out.
People like Ophelia Benson who refuse to substitute their own conception of reality for ours are shameful bigots and full of hate.
That’s not a helpful comment, esper.
I daresay it’s pretty gross comment.
Probably someone from the slime pit. It’s a new commenter.
So while you’re policing and belittling people’s emotions, maybe you can just go all the way and tell Joe how he is supposed to feel?
xyz (to Ophelia, presumably):
Does Ophelia seem serene to you?
Tell Joe how he is supposed to feel about what? His hyperbolic attacks on me?
I’m not sure how to say this. In some ways it feels wrong to, but on the other hand shit has gone so overboard that I think it will provide some perspective.
Or maybe I’m wrong, maybe this will make things worse. So please read this knowing that I have the best intentions.
When I was last active on Twitter over a year ago, Improbable Joe was one of my two best friends on the platform.
I liked him. I STILL like him.
He’s also a major part of why I left.
Joe and I are a lot alike. We both suffer from depression. We both, when in the worst parts of it, tend to see things pessimistically… and sometimes lash out. I think anyone who suffers from depression can identify with that.
I left Twitter (in part) because Joe, when depressed, would drink and start getting hostile and self-pitying, and would take it out on his twitter friends. His best twitter friend often had to tell him to knock it off and go to bed.
I couldn’t handle it because it brought out bad things in ME… but I also left Twitter for completely unrelated reasons.
At any rate, I have heard (but not confirmed) that a lot of the recent furor started with accusations by Joe. If that is wrong, I apologize. I apologize to Joe REGARDLESS of what started it all for focusing on him so much here, but I think it needs to be said that he has a habit of lashing out wildly at even his best friends.
I sympathize. I know it all too well.
But I also see this in others on FTB. One starts, the rest pile on. About three years ago maybe I was probably one of the worst offenders.
So many people seem determined to read things in the worst way possible. So many seem happy to pile on.
So many want to score some anger points – like the person who messaged me last night that I have “no pace on their friends list because of my support for OB’s transphobic bullshit” merely because I was disgusted at the “gotcha” atmosphere. The person who then left me on their friends list, message blinking and waiting, presumably primed for a back-and-forth.
And frankly, as someone I know put it, so many CIS men glad of the opportunity to bash a feminist while still scoring ally cookies.
To anyone saying that it’s wrong for OP to make posts like this, can you honestly say you would react differently under the ind of onslaught she has been dealing with?
Let me remind you all. There are PERSONALITIES involved here. Transgendered persons who have faced a lot of bullshit and gunshy about the possibility of hearing it from a place where they felt safe… bloggers who don’t like having people demand that the words they write follow a specific script… readers who want to be supportive of persecuted people and MIGHT be too eager at times to haul out the protest signs… depressed and hurting people who react to conflict in their trusted space with confusion and anger…
… and also shit-stirrers who lie and distort and post fake incriminating “comments”because they hate… they hate transgender women, they hate CIS women, they hate feminists, they hate liberals, they hate anyone who blogs or comments or dwells here because of bullshit turf wars… and they LOVE to get people fighting.
Is there really that much separating the “sides” in this conflict? Do you REALLY think there is such a divide?
REALLY? Because if you do I think you are reading something besides the words OB has posted, at least the ones I’ve seen here, where she accepts trans people’s identities as what they themselves present.
There is so much bullshit going on here.
Anyway, you can call me petty and vindictive or whatever else you want…
But I can tell you from experience that I like Joe. When he was asking for help buying an amp on twitter I’m the only person who donated cash… he was one of the two people I interacted with most… and I left Twitter in part because he would sometimes violently lash out at people with baseless claims and it made me sad.
Joe’s a good person, and Joe is an unreliable witness.
I probably am too, so take this for what it’s worth. And Joe, if this gets back to you, I hope you’re doing well and wish you the best.
As for the rest of you, I hope you learn to chill the fuck out and take a breather now and then.
And then once you have… READ THE WORDS. Not your feelings.
I also saw a comment under your name in a blogpost. I was a bit surprised as it was blatantly anti-trans but it seemed reasonable (as in, calm and non-slurry) and used similar language as you so I wasn’t incredulous about its authenticity. I was thinking about writing about or replying to it but decided against it. It’s uncool for someone to impersonate you, if that’s true and you didn’t just change your mind about a distasteful comment. Good wishes, Ophelia.
Jesus… And here I was on this new crappy laptop trying to type OB (Ophelia’s initials) and it habitually came out OP (Original Poster)… Sorry, Ophelia.
Could you tell me where, please, so that I can do something about it?
I would tell you if you weren’t such a transphobe (based on what you’ve said here, on this very blog).
Well THAT’S an ethical position to take. /rolleyes
Have you checked to make sure that the transphobic comment that you suspect is fake that you are happy to keep hidden from Ophelia so as to falsely implicate her isn’t one you happened to type yourself?
You know… like… by accident?
9_9
Jafafa Hots:
Actually, I pitched in $20 to help him buy that then, too. I barely knew him, but he seemed like a nice guy. At the time, he said that he was depressed that I (a virtual stranger) had chipped in that much (which was a lot to him, but not much of a hardship for me), while his longtime friends on twitter hadn’t contributed hardly anything.
I agree that he is basically a good guy. But also quite volatile. Kudos to you for sticking up for your friend.
Oh, Cool, MrFancyPants, I must have missed that.
Yeah, it was a little sad, which is why I gave, though as a general principle I don’t contribute to Patreon accounts, etc., not because I disagree with them, but because I’m on disability and can’t even support myself 😛
Yes thank you for that Jafafa.
I too like Joe. I’ve been saying I tried to make a point of chatting with him because he gets depressed and then feels rejected…but I omitted to say that it was also because he’s good company on Twitter (when he’s not lashing out). Funny, perceptive, funny – he’s good value.
Except for the lashing out part.
I want to underscore this section from Jafafa Hots’ comment:
That ought to be carved into stone.
@ Jafafa Hots:
I’ve stayed out of this argument (I have no stake, therefore…), but I’m slightly amazed that in the presence of provocateurs that this fight is happening so publicly. Thus, highlighting this particular section of your comment, though I don’t want to be read as commenting at all on Improbable Joe (a commenter I respect highly, for the record).
@Julia S:
If you’re sincere, and you’re actually not telling Ophelia Benson about someone impersonating her because of your perception of her, you need to take a step back and contemplate ethical behavior. Or you’re a ‘pitter, and you’re just shit-stirring. Either way, you’ve completely lost the moral high ground.
Also, hail Ophelia, the single most oppressive person towards trans people ever. I mean, fuck.
Amazing, isn’t it?
“I’ve told you a million times — don’t exaggerate!”
Ophelia, are Trans-Native Americans actually Native Americans?
Yes or no?
troll
Time for you to go away, esper. You’re not helping.
@llewelly 36, 39
It’s a good thing to be concerned about a friend who is feeling bad so I understand that you came here to talk about how some felt about what Ophelia did. But as you say, this is a public blog. I’m not insensitive to why people feel negatively about something, but it’s not unreasonable for me to wonder about what you are talking about since you did not quote anything or say what form the denial took. I want to make sure I understand you correctly.
You may not have mentioned meds, but what you did do was post this,
What form does the denial take? Because Ophelia missing signs of a message being private is not a denial, it is a mistake. That is negligence and I acknowledged that in my previous comment (being more careful about context). The fact that this message was not meant for a broader audience does change the words. It’s still reasonable for someone to be concerned about another person linking them to a need for medication in the middle of a social conflict (more on that below).
What would you want done?
It’s reasonable and good to be worried about the effects of screen grabs of the blog post before the identity was stripped. But those screen grabs will be floating around no matter what is done so what matters now is how Ophelia and the rest of us choose to act from here. So far she has chosen to agree that the picture should not have been posted and taken it down. But she is also apparently leaving this post here as a record of what happened as a mistake which is reasonable since people like to do things from exaggerate to outright lie about her, and I don’t mean your friend. Such screen grabs are just as threatening to Ophelia. You will have to ask Ophelia about what you have in mind.
If I see anyone use a screenshot I will tell them they are violating the privacy of another person and if needed I will note that using bad behavior to criticize something they see as bad behavior is not a decent thing to do (In addition responding to the substance of whatever they are arguing).
It’s also reasonable to want admit the mistake. Ophelia has done that.
I’m not unfriendly to a general concern for how our expression affects and effects (“contribution”, I only mention it because you use both words in different places) other people. But I don’t know what the denial looks like. I see the mistake though.
“Denialism” does not work. I think hyperbole is a better interpretation (if you want me to defend hyperbole I am willing) because I see no knowledge of the fact that the conversation was supposed to be private in the original post. I believe that you feel like it’s denialism, but denialism requires a person to avoid changing something after being shown. She deleted image once she was made aware of the private status. What is she continuing to do that constitutes “denialism”?
Crap, there is always one.
In 65 my second paragraph should read “The fact that this message was not meant for a broader audience does not change the words. It’s still reasonable for someone to be concerned about another person linking them to a need for medication in the middle of a social conflict (more on that below).”
Correction: time for them to be sent away.
@ Jafafa Hots, 60:
No kidding.
@ Ophelia Benson: From what I’ve read so far, your posts have been primarily defensive, and perhaps feed a narrative of dodging questions. But I sure as fuck want to be clear that I am not criticizing you for that! Creationists at Pharyngula don’t get treated this uncharitably, for fuck’s sake.
The current brouhaha started with this comment. A few people took exception to it in various forms. OB replied in a way that suggested either misunderstanding the concerns or dodging the question. Various people asked for clarification again, and some of them escalated, leading to the now notorious “Ophelia. Do you believe trans women are women, yes or no?” and a few other comments that were deleted. Things escalated further when OB chose to promote her response to a blog post. The Improbable Joe thing was a part of the fallout and came a day later.
That’s a very weird reading. I don’t think that llewelly was talking about the private status of the message, just the general point of the original post. Which is, errr, ridiculing the emotional reactions a couple of people said they were having to the conflict, as far as I can determine.
Ophelia@38
I apologize, I thought that I remember you critizing Dawkins stupid rape-weightings partly because of possible triggering effects, but I stand corrected.
MrFancyPants@41
Thanks for trying to understand – yes, your statements 1-4 are a good summary of what I wanted to say.
But doesn’t the same hold for people reading FTB- a community that usually prouds itself on being especially welcoming to everyone? And yes, reading this blog is totally voluntary, but so is reading Dawkins Twitter accounts. (Has he ever even said those things in a university lecture?)
But she puts the quote of a person telling us how she needed medication after reading Ophelias Blogposts under a heading that sarcastically talks about her “superpowers”. If I were said person, I would think this very callous. And if this comment is “representative of more public comments” – why not quoting them?
I probably do not read this correctly because to me it seems to say that this blog is definitely not meant to be a welcoming and safe place for people with transgender issues? Is that what you meant (reading this blog is similar to walking off a pier)?
sonderval:
Are you serious?
Why should Ophelia be welcoming to people who harass her, whether over trans issues or any other? Why can’t she be curt with those who do?
This isn’t about trans issues, it’s about rumor-mongering gone amok and motivated reasoning.
(You think people with trans issues are exempt from normal courtesy?)
@John Morales
O.k., probably I don’t know enough about the details – I understood the comment quoted in the original post as being by someone who felt triggered in a bad way by Ophelia’s seeming (by now corrected anyway) unwillingness to answer the question “are trans women women” in a direct way. I could understand that such triggering might occur (because as far as I understand, trans people often face this problem of being denied their belonging to the correct gender).
If the comment is instead by someone who has themselves harrassed or bullied Ophelia in this context, then my reading of the whole post is obviously wrong (as is my reading of MrSmartyPants comments) and it is rather like someone looking for a way to be offended. If that is the situation, then I was simply wrong and my perception of a double standard obviously was, too.
sonderval, my previous was not a reference to the OP, rather a response to your response to MrFancyPants.
I shan’t say anything about Improbable Joe, who long ago asked me never to address him again (which I respect), but regarding the first example I read it just as you do, given Ophelia stated she hasn’t interacted with them for maybe a year.
So, given that: Do you think it’s reasonable to hold Ophelia responsible for that specific expressed distress, given the last few days’ timeline?
(Who has been provoking whom?)
I don’t think you’re “simply wrong”, but I do think you’re quicker to make (hopefully, provisional) determinations than I am.
In re. the OP, transwomen aren’t “dying,” they are being KILLED BY MEN. Men who do not listen to feminists. Men who kill women ALL THE TIME. Gender analysis is not an “intellectual exercise” for women any more than the analysis of racism is an “intellectual exercise” for black people. Stop enabling the perpetrators of violence to use one group of victims as human shields against another group of victims. (Also: stop acting like sex is the only axis of oppression that is intersected by other axes of privilege, especially while you are leveraging the violence towards poor transwomen of color involved in the underground economy in 2/3 world countries in order to protect white, middle class part-time crossdressers who spend all their time online yelling about female privilege.)
I want to be crystal clear here. Who, precisely, are the “white, middle class part-time crossdressers” about whom you are speaking? Because I haven’t seen any drag queens involved in this conversation.
Sass:
An assertion followed by a request in the imperative mood.
(cf. my #72)
OB: The atmosphere here is completely toxic. You have to get out of here, and fast.
@John
I am not sure I am able to judge responsibility here – I would in any case not blame her for that alone.
But I do not understand why Ophelia felt the need to share this comment here under the heading of “I have superpowers”. This seems to deny that the triggering has actually happened and been caused by her, and that is – in my opinion – still quite similar to Dawkins “University is probably not for you”.
@Z says 70
You could be right, but that’s why I wanted llewelly to tell me what they meant. A reasonable interpretation is that Ophelia is ridiculing the claim that they could be linked to someone else’s need to take medication.
Even there I think that ridicule of what people say is an acceptable social tool/weapon. I think ridiculing beliefs, ideas and actions (like a statement) is acceptable, but needs morals and ethics for proper use (that Ophelia’s use was immoral or unethical requires separate demonstration). If someone in a social conflict involving me made a statement interpretable as a claim that their medication needs were connected to my political behavior I might react with ridicule too. I think the “superpowers” hyperbole is pretty mild and not a ridicule of someone taking medication in general as some have claimed.
@sonderval78
See my reply to Z says. In the context of a social conflict, tying a person’s behavior to one’s medications needs is worthy of a response. Ophelia felt it appropriate to mock the suggestion that they were taking meds because of her. I don’t see why this is a problem.
A choice to talk about one aspect of a situation is not a denial of other aspects. I honestly see framing it as denial as a shady means of manipulating Ophelia into talking about what someone else wants her to talk about.”Shady” because denial requires some from of ongoing irrational minimization or ignoring of something and no one has showed evidence of the irrational minimization or ignoring. I just looks like they just went straight to asserting it was bad that she did not talk about how the mockery of a suggested connection felt. Ideas sometimes get mocked.
To me it looks like as many of us do, Ophelia sees use of negative emotion in social conflicts as something that can be appropriate to use (as do I). So she dispensed with saying that she knows this and cut straight to the statement like many tend to do. We don’t have an agreed on social ritual where every time someone is about to use negative emotion in a social conflict they justify it. Maybe we should have one but that is a separate subject and so it’s not really a good objection to what Ophelia wrote in my opinion.
@Brony
So if someone who has been strongly affected by, for example, sexism in her job would say that reading Hunt’s sexist remarks triggered a wave of anger in her and led her to take some medication against that, would you also agree that it would be o.k. to mock this person?
If not, where exactly is the difference?
Well one place the difference is, is that they did not say anything about reading me. It was just “thanks a lot myname”.
Ophelia Benson @82,
I suspect I am misunderstanding your point here, would you mind clarifying? I don’t mean to be intrusive and I’m not demanding an answer or anything like that, I’m just trying to wrap my head around what you are saying and want to be sure I’m not misinterpreting what you mean in the process.
So are you saying that if the comment had just included “I just read Ophelia’s latest…” or something to that effect, then you would not have thought it was OK to mock the person or to post their comment? But since it didn’t mention that the person had read you, then that makes it OK?
As I said I suspect I’m misunderstanding your point, but I’m having trouble figuring out what else you may have meant given the context.
@sonderval
It’s wise to be concerned about expression of negative emotion for the purposes of social change so I hope you see that I’m giving you a serious answer. I don’t mind being challenged because it’s serious and I happen to be fascinated by how emotions, conflict, argument and similar work. That sort of fascination should be paired with some criticism but I have one peeve I will mention since we are now going abstract, at some point this should be compared to fully real, concrete situations. I don’t change how I do social conflict lightly and often people use substance-less criticism as a means of making something they don’t like go away. I don’t cooperate with that for long.
I am also aware of the awful examples of the use of negative emotion online that are not legitimate and cause suffering (harassment designed to make people shut up, microaggressions, threats, more…). That is why I think about morals and ethics for this. Mere expression of negative emotion like mockery is not going anywhere because it is ultimately a feature of how our minds work and I think it is better to have people familiar with how these things should be done instead of trying to suppress them without learning what they are and how to control them. I want to see every kind of person equally able to do this without facing things like systemic bigotry as a strategy to suppress it.
This is not exhaustive but I keep things like this in mind. It is also not specifically to do with your example but has things to think about in other situations as well.
*”The way that person acts makes me need to take medication!” is a powerful social tool/weapon. We should not let people wield it lightly, but we should take it into account as much as we can if there is good evidence that it is true.
*It is likely they will be taking medication on a regular basis for something that can be exacerbated by social stress. I would not rule out the possibility it is still medicine taken as needed, but this is a reason to ask them if they take it this way.
*Is this the first time this person has shown that they need to take medication for social stress? If so I would be friendly to accommodating this and would drop the mockery in interactions with this person if mockery was something that caused this. I would also tell people in situations that I am in that they should respect the same if the person demonstrates that they need such an accommodation.
*Social distance. While I believe Tim Hunt did things worthy of criticism and mockery, holding him responsible for someone else having to take medication is not normally reasonable unless this is a person they are likely to interact with and they have reason to know about it. If I met someone that I harmed in such a way and it was indirect I would feel bad that it happened, but I still have to weigh emotional effectiveness and the importance of social change.
I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect someone to avoid negative social expression as a general rule unless it’s a person they are directly interacting with and they are aware of the problem. We still use such expression as a social tool and are in the process of finding broadly agreed upon rules as a society (which will be a messy business). I would also be on the lookout for evidence that this person was abusing the ability to claim the sensitivity, but would not assume anything without evidence.
* The specific manifestation of the mockery. Not all humor is equal. Not all mockery is equal. “Superpowers” is mild to me, what Ophelia pointed out on the “Deserving” thread is simply disgusting for reasons that I stated over there.
*Once evidence arises that it is repeated and unwelcome I will stop if the person asks (unless there are extenuating circumstances that prevent it from being harassment like I am mocking someone who I know is abusively using the medicine claim on me or someone else and they will not stop).
*I’m sure there are more things that I look for but would need to think about it.
There is no “exactly”. One of the frustrating things about us symbol-spewing apes is that while there are general rules that our psychology, emotions, perception and memory function on, they are nothing but guidelines to consider in real-world situations. The specifics of reality are what determine what should be done. That is why I only have partial respect for philosophical discussions as the are often used.
Lots of first-time posters in this thread, some of them saying some really sketchy things.
Yes, I’ve sent one away, will others as needed.
@Ophelia
O.k., I inferred that (perhaps incorrectly), because otherwise their post made no sense to me. If they instead were told about your POV by a third party or sought the posts out after being told what they contain – so basically if they looked for something being offended by – then any mockery of yours would be more than justified. So if this was your reading of the situation, I can understand your post and mockery much better.
@Brony
Thanks for the detailed and elaborate answer. I myself also find it very difficult to weigh these things (that’s why I’m asking) – for example, if some hard-line creationist would tell me that me blogging about evolution stressed them extremely, would I feel responsible for that? Probably not. OTOH: Would I mock them? Also probably not (but who knows, not all days and moods are the same..). So basically I’m asking these questions here to understand how other people judge this kind of problems.
Perhaps that’s one of my problems with the post – it seems (in the context) to imply that a blog post cannot affect anyone with whom you do not interact personally. But if that were true, why would Ophelia write a blog anyway? So this kind of mocking seemed a bit dishonest to me. Of course, if what I wrote above to Ophelia was the actual situation, then, yes, this way of mocking would be spot-on. So (as I said initially), I may have read the situation wrongly.
In any case, thanks for elaborating on your point of view; it helped me to see that (and why) other people may draw lines differently than I would.
@MrFancyPants
If this was aimed at me, I have commented here (very) occasionally for quite a while, although I’m usually just lurking.
sonderval – of course their post made no sense. That was the point. It’s a completely random, absurd, cargo cult thing to say. That was the point. It doesn’t need all this profound analysis and reading in of elements that aren’t there – the post is exactly as random and cargo cult as it looks. There’s nothing more to it than that.
@Ophelia
Since you know a lot more about details than I do, I’ll take your word for it.
Thanks again for discussing this and I’m sorry that I seemed to heap things upon you while you are already under constant barrage of attacks.
sonderval, there aren’t any details to know. That’s what I’m saying. There’s only what I showed.
I was once very slightly online-acquainted with this person, but that makes no difference here. It does nothing to explain the post.
@Ophelia
I understand.
Sorry again if I added in any way to what seems to be a rather ugly situation.