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1:32pm June 30, 2014

amorpha-system:

Protips if you want to start an “argument” with me.

(Disclaimer: This is very definitely one of those “only about me, not anyone else in here” things.)

1. When I am arguing, you will know I am arguing.  I am one of those people who can be very confrontational when they’re angry, and perfectly calm an hour later when things are resolved.  But at least my friends never have any doubt about whether I’m in an argument or not. (And I see arguments and debates as different things.  This may or may not be a result of a language disability-based misunderstanding, but distinguishing between them is, nonetheless, something that’s been consistently useful to me.)

2. When I say “This is shitty and should not happen,” I am not “taking a line of argument.”  That is, with all due respects, a very Western view of what argument and debate mean.  It is also a view that’s heavily privileged in academia— when everything that comes out of your mouth (or keyboard, as the case may be) is assumed to be a line of argument structured in a certain way, that you’re able and prepared to defend in various ways, and that you thought in terms of “covering every base” when you “made your argument” (and are able to constantly and consistently do so every time you state an opinion).

3. When something pops up as a reblog across your dashboard, and you feel compelled to do a “good deed” by arguing against what you *think* the person is saying, you should find out who the person or people saying it are before engaging in a lengthy rebuttal.  If you like to use that line about “educate yourself,” remember it doesn’t just apply to communities, but to individual people too.  Some of the people involved may have been subjected to continual harassment, silencing, and what I can only describe as willful malicious misunderstanding, over having disabilities that make it impossible for them to participate in arguments and debates in a culturally standard, expected way.  Some of them may have written at length about this, and you may find if you go to read other things they’ve written that they have already brought up and addressed many of your misunderstandings and concerns about what they were doing. (You might also find that you’ve been saying “cis people aren’t entitled to politeness from trans people” to… someone who is trans themselves.)

4. I do not believe I am entitled to politeness from anyone.  If I did, I would have left the internet long ago.  In fact, as an abuse survivor, it has often been difficult for me to believe I am entitled to even half-decent treatment from most people.  I am perfectly fine dealing with people who are just brusque in stating their opinions and don’t sugarcoat things.  Some of my best friends are like that.  But there is a difference between lack of politeness and willfully being an asshole.  If a reblog of someone being an ass pops up on my dash, I’m like “yeah, no, bye.”  If someone consistently pursues me and tries to bait me into arguments by willfully being an asshole, I will eventually return their attitude telling them to knock it the fuck off.

5. There are (is? blah, language) not a finite number of stock opinions in the world.  Just because someone appears at first glance to be saying something you have trained yourself to argue against, does not mean it actually *is* that opinion; they may be coming from a position you didn’t even know existed.

6. I have the right to say “Nuh uh.  Not going to engage here beyond saying ‘read other things we’re written,’ if someone thinks they see a stock argument they’ve trained themselves to argue against and immediately launches into an argument against things I was actually never saying in the first place.”  Because I have better and frankly more survival-oriented things to do.

-S.