James Finn In my previous comment, I forgot to include that I unfollowed the publication, and I think that’s important to explicity state.

I read a response comment to your post that didn’t sit well with me, and then I reflected on it for 24 hours. I don’t want what I’m going to say to get lost in a response to a response, so I’m going to just directly comment here. Hope that’s okay, James.

We as peripheralized minorities, on whichever factors that’s based, are stronger when we unite. That’s true, and our own suffering affords us the capacity to empathize with the suffering of other marginalized groups.

However, unity is not uniformity. For example, I don’t truly understand the everyday struggles that an LGBT child grows up with. Even the best of men can’t exactly know what it’s like to walk in a woman’s shoes within the patriarchy. And so it goes.

What you posted is very brave and necessary. What people seem to miss is that often bigotry is conducted indirectly. It’s coded in vague words, and bigoted gatekeepers have long marginalized groups of people by simply not allowing their voices to be heard.

So asking for specific evidence where someone says, “I discriminate against X group,” is in itself problematic. It’s often not available. What is available are trends and an analysis of the rhetoric someone’s using. You provided that.

Secondly, it’s very harmful to a conversation about creating a just society when a counter-argument is basically saying, “well I’m not discriminated against, so what are you talking about!” Discrimination is way more complicated than that.

We should have conversations like adults, and we should utilize logic when we do that. Thanks for writing this. I’ve been thinking about your post for a while now.