#99% of the bullshit yall argue about

[sundecided]

can yall be normal for like Five Fucking Minutes

[smarmykemetic]

If you want the people who disagree with you all the time to respect you, well respect has to be earned, you cas't just demand it.

When I got this anon the other day, I ultimately decided to ignore it, because I knew it was almost certainly from the same person who sent me these (x x x), as well as several other pieces of anonymous hatemail that I chose to ignore; as well as almost certainly from one of the same two people (BBSAS and anubianpagan) who I am 99% sure run that anonymous chickenshit drama blog that, ultimately, does nothing but provide a platform for racist, self-righteous cowards to be racist, self-righteous cowards. However, since I just saw in my notes that this same blog has tagged me once again, I decided that I may as well go ahead and give this anon the answer I would give it if I genuinely believed that the sender wanted a conversation about my MO when it comes to what I mean by “respect” and how yall can expect me to treat “””people who disagree with me all the time”””” (read: crypto-fascists and their “centrist” or in some cases, “classically liberal” enablers). 

This is gonna be a long one, so buckle up:

I treat internet arguments that I either start or stumble into, first by giving the other person the benefit of the doubt, and assuming that whatever the disagreement is, is probably a matter of misinformation or miscommunication. Most of the conflicts I deal with online and irl seem to boil down to this in some way, shape, or form, so these days the first thing I do in a confrontation is show my opponent the basic respect of assuming that they are a rational, free-thinking, intelligent person with the best of intentions who just doesn’t know what they’re talking about as well as they think they do. People get very very angry with me when I let on that that is what I think is happening, so I usually try to give them the information and perspectives that I have without being mean or smug. This is also the stage where I sometimes find out that I don’t know what I’m talking about as well as I thought I do; and while it’s usually not fun to find that out, and the other person is usually very smug and mean when they tell me, I’m proud to announce that I have the basic respect for myself, my opponents, and objective fuckin’ reality that I have no problem posting publicly, “I stand corrected; my opponent was right and I was wrong” when I have been convinced, either through hard evidence or persuasive arguments, that I was wrong about something. In fact, I have a tag specifically for admitting i’m wrong and apologizing on both my tumblr blogs (x x). 

The thing is, often, no amount of sharing information or clarifying my political, philosophical, or personal reasons for taking a certain stance on something, will cause the other person to back off or admit they may have been wrong about something. When I realize that I’m dealing with someone who has already decided what they believe and is just going to waste my time by regurgitating points that they obviously heard either on some edgy adult cartoon show that they clearly believe is not just “funny”, but the holder of some kind of deep moral philosophical wisdom; or on some online meme page that, either knowingly or unknowingly, posts literal crypto-fascist propaganda (here’s where i plug a youtube series that has been invaluable in helping me learn to recognize crypto-fascists, in our community and outside of it; no, this particular youtube series is not my only source on this topic; it’s just the one I think is best for this context)…when I realize that is the situation, I once again extend my opponent the basic respect of assuming that they are a rational, free-thinking, intelligent person who has decided, for whatever reason, to believe the things that they believe. I give them credit for believing the things that they argue in favor of, the things that they send me hatemail for criticizing them for, that they are so fucking furious about that they decide the only way they can possibly deal with the alleged authoritarian injustice of me writing and posting things online, is going around and anonymously, desperately trying to get people to believe that I am crazy, or an immature “child”, or a liar, or a dangerous violent extremist, or in league with A/pep itself. Or, usually, all of the above.

I respect them enough to treat them as what they are telling me, both with their words and actions, that they are. And I treat them with all of the “””respect””” that is due to somebody who acts and behaves that way: almost none. As in, so little that I have absolutely no interest in engaging with you or your ideas in any kind of a serious “debate”. So little that I am not interested in meeting whatever standards you may choose to list so that I may, as you say, “””earn your respect”””. In fact, I respect you so little that I am not and will not ever genuinely “demand” your “respect”, because I do not want to be “respected” by you and others like you. I aspire to have as little to do with you as possible. I aspire to prevent you from hurting me, or my friends, or my family, or my neighbors with your racist, fear-mongering bullshit. I aspire to make you change your mind about acting on the things you are telling me you believe; your *~*~opinions~*~* about why you say and do the things you do do not matter to me at all.

Some may say this attitude is mean or unfair. I say that this attitude is simply me refusing to play the respectability politics game, no matter how much anybody whines and screams and cries anonymously, anywhere online. Some may say that this is about me “lacking the emotional maturity” to deal with you and your ilk. I say that this is about me having the compassion for, and solidarity with, and basic respect for the marginalized and oppressed in the Kemetic community that is required to look at someone saying something like, “Hey, what if it’s actually okay to be racist so long as we say we’re not being racist,” and tell them to either shut the fuck up or leave.

Here’s the thing. The advice that virtually every single adult I have ever talked to, and DEFINITELY every single Internet Polytheist Leader Person, gives me for these situations -the situation of dealing with a would-be bully, either on the school playground or on the internet, is to “just ignore them and they’ll go away”. Online, this is usually phrased as, “Don’t feed the trolls”. THIS IS AMONG THE WORST ADVICE I HAVE EVER RECEIVED by the metric of “what actually makes the situation, for me and my friends who are getting bullied, any better”. What this advice does in real life, is allow the bully to realize they have found the thing that every bully is always looking for: an easy target. When you “ignore” bullies in the hopes that they get bored and go away, all you are doing long-term is teaching the bully that there are no consequences for their actions. I didn’t listen to this advice in the first fucking grade; I didn’t listen to it when people told me that’s how I should deal with Solo and their fanclub harassing, threatening, blackmailing, cyberstalking and ultimately doxing me “because I annoyed them”; and I am not going to listen to it now, because that advice does not work and is not meant to help me not get bullied; it is meant to help the authority figure in charge of the situation not have to deal with it personally because, in the words of a serial rapist who was believed over all of his victims for years because he was just such a Nice Guy who everyone loved so fuckin’ much they refused to believe he was capable of rape: “The parent doesn’t want justice, the parent wants quiet.” The reasons and the opinions of the people who give me the advice I know is bad and doesn’t work are irrelevant to me, because at the end of the day,if no one else is willing to, i have to defend myself and my community from the people who would tear us apart in the name of having their right to be racist pricks “respected”.

So, no, I will not be silently accepting whatever abuse you choose to pour into the kemetic tag or into my inbox in the name of “being the bigger person”. I also will not be going and finding any of the people choosing to send me this abuse, and let them set the terms of engagement and tone of the conversation, and take them seriously as they tell me all of this fucking racist nonsense that they delusionally believe is a bunch of Rational Fair Good Points About Politics and Kemeticism. And, once again to make sure it sinks in, I tell all of you, sincerely: I do not and will not EVER give enough of a fuck about “respecting” your whiny anonymous opinions, to stop saying what I’m saying. I respect you enough not to attempt to proselytize or “sell you” on my religious beliefs, but I do not “respect” you enough (or rather, in the way that you wish I “respected” you) to keep my story, as I have experienced it, a secret to protect your feelings and egos. 

If I blocked you, you’re staying blocked. If you’re anonymous, your opinion doesn’t matter because you will not stand by it. Put up or shut up.

[toadsong]

this might come off ruder than i mean, so sorry in advance! im a big big fan of robots but personally i have a lot of trouble getting into dbh bc it seems like 99% of the fanbase is all about fetishizing mlm n torturing mlm n shit like that, and i was wondering how you personally managed to get past that stuff

You’re fine!!!

The secret??? I don’t go into the tumblr tag. At all. I make my own art, I go to AO3 (where i can block certain tags or search certain tags very easily), searching up stupid memes and animations on youtube, and every now and then i stumble across nice DBH art blogs who aren’t nasty randomly and i enjoy their content, and a lot of the time, if you like that it should start recommending you similar, Good Content. 

Still, I have gone through the tumblr tag once or twice- it had a lot of nasty stuff, but if im being honest, only a little more than any other fandom it’s size. The biker a fandom, the nastier the fanbase has the potential to become. 

Most of my issues lie in the game itself, and how people sort of… fetishize Conner, Gavin, and rk900. The game itself had some really generic plots, thinly veiled allusions to racism, and all and all you could tell it was made by a white dude :/ and then the fandom takes the 4 main white dudes in the game and kinda Super Fetishized them.

My solution? Exactly what i said in the first comment. I make my own content, acknowledging but ultimately ignoring the bullshit that the creator put into the game and doing what i liked and enjoyed from it!!Kara was super cute and i felt the need to fix the rather.. lacking emotional relationship with Alice, Markus had so much depth with Karl and the rest of Jericho [everyone argues about markus/north or markus/simon but like. C’mon yall. Robot poly], Connor had a load of bullshit and probably some PTSD, Connor’s weird codependence with Hank and exploring the android/human differences, Luther is a huge sweetheart but ready 2 throw down, all of the *good* shit.

It also helps to make your own community!!! I kinda got a few of my friends into DBH by watching a youtube play it (Jaksepticeye had a good one) and we kind of have our own thing where we make good content with and for each other. 

It all comes down to lifting the rock away from you in case something jumps out, y’know? Tread carefully in public fandom, but if it doesn’t satisfy you, store-bought fandom is fine.

[zebrasaursaylor]

Um. Ngl. Minus the flags thats what 99% of houses look like in the county, like def dont pretend like its "poor people" because ill tell ya what theres ALOT of people who live in houses that look like that and aren't actually poor. And from what i can see thats not even really a crappy house for the area. The crappy ones are the ones with tarps for roofs.

Its more bc its just a huge echo chamber full of alcohol.

And its annoying all these city people saying this shit, like yall may care about money but thats not how it is in the county in Michigan and that's not what those people care about. They want to pretend to be tough and like to have control over everyone, all their buddies agree and add their own comments, add alcohol, and you have an echo chamber of hate with no voice of reason to stop them.

When you live in an area thats pretty much 100% white, with a bunch of like minded people and pretty much no one else with any different ideas, limited actual news sources/access to those news sources, thats what you get. Its basically the game telephone but with an entire area .

If every single person around you your entire life spews stupid bullshit and its all you hear, youre gonna believe and also spew that bullshit and chances are no one is gonna argue with you, which just makes them think its actually not bullshit.

Tbh if you dont live in areas like this, you won't get it. But it definitely has nothing to do with money.

Like, last I checked there are a lot of poor people living in crappy houses out there and they don't plan to kidnap and eventually execute the governor of Michigan