This post has content warnings for: discussion of misogyny, discussion of fascism, mention of Nazis, we swear it's an uplifting post though.
- he/him
one more cute disaster… it’s hard here in paradise
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in reply to @ireneista's post:
if you're at a bar and there's a nazi, you're in a nazi bar
this is closely related to the Paradox of Tolerance, yes, but it's more operationally focused, like what it means for building communities (edit: typo)
oh nothing to apologize for, we're just in educator mode ;) our goal here is to inform
Our general rules would be something along the lines of "Does this behavior foster belongingness? Is this behavior loving? Is this behavior helpful?"
That's where the "cruel jokes about women" would come into question. Does it foster belongingness? No, it fosters shame & exclusion. Is this behavior loving? If the joke is cruel, per the definition of said joke, then no it's not loving. Is this behavior helpful? The person in question's "culture" is to use cruel jokes about women to feel better about something. But is it really "helping" that person? Or is it a deflection? It's likely some type of self-defense/defense mechanism and putting off really introspecting and considering their behavior. It's short-term gain but long-term suffering. The 3rd question might not be answerable in this case, but the fact that it fails the first 2 checks would mean the behavior isn't OK and warrants a reminder of the general rules/guidelines. If the culture of the group is decent, the person will be able to reconsider their behavior & their desire to belong to the group.
these are good criteria for sure, and we do think that sort of thing should be the first resort. we also note that there are definitely situations where they don't help because there isn't a clear moral character to the friction between people. people need different things sometimes. even well-meaning people.
As inside, so outside — even within groups, people choose who to be closer to. It's up to a community's culture what's OK, and it's up to the community members whom within the community they consort with most frequently or deeply.
Take a group based on "People who love tennis" — to pick something relatively innocuous. However, members who "think only men should play tennis" may or may not belong in that community. That's up to the culture of that community or whether they explicitly redefine the group to "People who love tennis and think everyone should be able to play." However, until & unless the group redefines itself, I would avoid that subset of the community who believes only men should play tennis, because I'm opposed to exclusion. I choose not to interact with them as much as possible.
I do this in the larger community/society all the time. I choose not to hang out with anti-maskers. There's not a specific community of "people still wearing masks" in the meat world, but I still would not voluntarily choose to hang with anti-maskers, even in a public park. Nearly all my friends are still masking to my knowledge, and I rarely see anyone in person anymore. These same interactions can take place in any community — choosing one's cliques and associates within a group.
Oh, and a lot of our thoughts around this have been studying more and more Systems Theory/Thinking, culture i.e. The Culture Code, positive psychology, and writing the United Front: Building Community curriculum which we're going to have to make into an ebook or something because it's definitely our magnum opus. And that's saying something after how much writing we've done over the years.
yes, absolutely. good stuff and you very much should put that in book form.