Tumblr, anyone?

[Noma Galway]

You've got a point. SJW definitely has a bad connotation. SJH is really appropriate, actually.

 

[Jabrosky]

Shouldn't there be a better way to differentiate the good SJWs from the bad SJWs? To me, being called an SJW is inherently a sarcastic put down. This is similar to arm-chair quarterback, Monday morning coach, or something similar. However, someone who fights for social justice should be something different. Or if the good SJW types want they could start calling the bad SJWs Social Justice Highwaymen, or SJH.

If they say things that are obviously hateful of white people, heterosexuals, men, or the cis-gendered, it shouldn't be hard to count them as "bad SJWs".

In other cases it isn't so straightforward. If they use vicious, intolerant tone when addressing anyone who disagrees with their particular view of righteousness, you might conclude they're the bad kind of SJWs too...but honestly, I can't say I always stand on the moral high ground when it comes to tone. Like many other autistics, I have a problem with melting my composure when arguing over sensitive topics, so I can be very abrasive when my buttons get pressed. And then there are certain types of people whom I have no respect for whatsoever, so I have few qualms about treating them rough. I will never apologize for seeing white supremacists as insecure chest-beating knuckleheads, misogynistic "PUA" pick-up artists as blustering omega-males who scare off way more women than they (pretend to) have ever "gamed", zealous religious fundamentalists as mindless slaves to obsolete superstitions, and all three of those groups as pathetic and/or psychopathic. Those camps all fall outside my moral compass because I see their ideologies as fundamentally evil and irrational, but then the SJWs see my own worldview the same way.

I guess that, when we interpret certain beliefs as wrong or harmful, we naturally perceive their strongest adherents as somehow unintelligent, corrupt, or at best misled. It's the only way we can make sense of people embracing beliefs antithetical to our own. In my own case, the autistic tendency towards moral absolutism, or black-and-white thinking, may exacerbate my reactions even more. But honestly, it's been my experience that those individuals who pride themselves the most on righteousness, the ones who cast themselves as the fiercest moral crusaders fighting for cultural reform, can be some of the most toxic to be around. They always interpret the slightest step out of line---the line they draw themselves---as a deep offense (and that's when they're not nudging that line to suit themselves). Step out of line more than once, and you might as well be their enemy.

Never mind good versus evil, some of the fieriest, bloodiest conflicts can happen between different concepts of goodness.

 

[cupiscent]

I think part of the problem with Tumblr is that it's a platform for statements, not for conversations. Every time you reply to something, it posts again to your own blog, so it becomes about making a statement, which tends to lead to less-nuanced interactions. Also, there's an amazing culture of fakery and not checking information that leads to viral transmission of misinformation - especially when if you note a correction on a post, only people who see that from your blog will be aware of the correction, so the cycle just carried on. It's a platform that doesn't make reasoned discussion and exploration of matters at all easy. But with careful curation of who you follow, it's no more toxic than twitter.

 

[Nimue]

The good thing about Tumblr, though, is that you can completely control who you're listening to. I don't see anything on my dash but well-informed, reasonable people, and when the crazies pop up, they're accompanied by a rebuttal from the aforementioned people.

I mean, I don't think that Tumblr is really a single entity, in the way that there're default subs for Reddit or the front page of a more curated website. You have to actually seek out the awful people, and at that point, why would you want to do that? (also, from what I've seen, conservative and/or racist people are just as much a problem as radical people in the other direction. Can't escape that stuff no matter where you go.)